I agree the national politicians and much of the British Press (especially the Daily Mail, but not, oddly all the Murdoch press) have behaved abominably. I dont think the BBC has. It is easy to pick on Nick Robinson as he is an acknowledged Tory, but I see people on the right also picking on Paul Mason because he used to belong to an extreme Trotskyist organisation: in fact both are effective and professional journalists who probably make a mistake now and again. It is interesting that, for all the organised attacks on the BBC, the YES campaign is still keen to argue that all the BBC will remain available in all of Scotland, when that will just not be the case. (It is not possible to access the BBC I-player from Spain, for example, without using dodgy software or VPNs). I am English, but I lived in Scotland for a year in the 1960s, and then from 1974-84 and went to high school in Ardrossan and then to the University of Edinburgh. So I have a real interest. I recall being physically bullied (kicked until I thought I had a permanent dent in my shins) in high school *because I was English*. (Perhaps they also know I was gay, but in fact I dont recall any harassment about that while at school.) It is possible that I am just one of those kids who get bullied, but it did not help having all those pathetic SNP posters up in the 1970s claiming Its Scotlands Oil. Why does mineral wealth somehow belong to people who live near it? And why did the kids wi plooks in Ardrossan have some claim to it while kids in Berwick or Newcastle Upon Tyne do not? Why was much of the oil not Shetlands or really Norways, since both the Shetlands and Orkney only came to Scotland via odd inheritance and marriage circumstances. (Shetland indeed only passed because it was a surety on a loan.) There is no justice in any formulation of nationalism as far as I am concerned, although I do not condemn those who have a different set of influences on their opinions. The British state is one of the longest lasting multi-cultural and poly-centric states in world history. The very real possibility of the emergence of a reactive Anglo-nationalism in England terrifies me. Tory politicians and UKIP are already playing on such feelings. My Scottish hero: Eric Liddell. https://youtube/watch?v=ZjF59VB0h6g
Posted on: Wed, 17 Sep 2014 13:18:23 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015