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"For as long as but a hundred of us remain alive, never will we on any conditions be brought under English rule. It is in truth not for glory, nor riches, nor honours that we are fighting, but for freedom — for that alone, which no honest man gives up but with life itself." --Declaration of Arbroath, 1320 In 2014 Scotland is due to go to the polls to decide on our future within or without the United Kingdom. It is a question that has a long and detailed history, the complex and uncertain relationship between Scotland and England going back thousands of years. But things have come to a head more recently and Scotland may soon become an independent nation for the first time in 300 years. Background on the Scottish Parliament The question of Home Rule for Scotland has been an issue in the relationship between Scotland and the central government in Westminster ever since the Kilbrandon Report in 1973 recommended a devolved Scottish assembly be given control over the running of Scottish affairs. One of the events which spurred the creation of this commission was a victory by the Scottish National Party in the 1967 by-election in Hamilton, their first victory at the national level in a "normal" election. Support for the Nationalists has fluctuated since that time, but until the beginning of the 21st century and the rise of reactionary and fascist parties such as UKIP and the BNP, they generally received the fourth largest share of the vote nationally despite running candidates only in a part of the United Kingdom which held about 10% of the population. In 1979, a referendum was held to ask whether scotland ought to have a devolved assembly to manage Scottish affairs. This assembly would not have any powers of taxation independent of the Westminister government and would be restricted in how it was allowed to allocate its funds. In a fashion that may seem like retrospective deja vu to anyone who saw the "[this baby] needs life-saving treatment, not an alternative voting system" adverts of the recent alternative vote referendum in the UK, the debate was therefore steered to the question of whether this assembly would just be a toothless waste of taxpayer money that could be used to better ends. Despite this, the referendum was a narrow victory for the "yes" campaign, with 51% of voters supporting devolution, with a turnout of 63%. However, one clause in the referendum legislation stated that a "yes" vote would be valid only if 40% of all eligible voters voted yes, and because this criteria was not met, devolution was not enacted. The SNP withdrew support from the minority Labour government (it was a Labour MP that inserted the clause regarding eligible voters), and a few weeks later a vote of no confidence toppled the Labour government, leading to an election and 18 years of Conservative government. In 1997 the first Labour government in almost 20 years was elected, and one of their key election promises in Scotland was the creation of a Scottish Parliament to give Scots some level of control over their own affairs. After a successful referendum on the issue, the Scottish Parliament was created and elections were held. SNP Majority Government The SNP had been the opposition part upon the creation of the parliament, which was essentially designed to create a roughly proportional house with the consequent effect of creating coalition government due to the four-way split in Scotland between Labour, the SNP, the Conservatives and the Liberal Democrats. For the first two terms of the Parliament the government consisted of a Labour/Liberal coalition, which was defeated by the SNP in 2007 which ran a minority government for four years. In the meantime, the Labour government down south was wavering and losing legitimacy, and after the Conservatives won power in general election in 2010 and began to govern with Liberal Democrat support, there was a significant shift in the electoral dynamics of Scotland. In 2011, the SNP won a landslide victory in the face of a weak and divided opposition, a collapse in the Lib Dem vote, and--allegedly--a deal between the SNP and News International which led to endorsements for the SNP from the Scottish Sun and favourable press in other NI media. The SNP, in the face of their victory, now intend to hold a referendum on Independence in 2014. Why does Scotland want independence? It's a bit simplistic to boil it down to "We hate the Tories", but as a symbol of the divide between Scotland and England it is a functional reason. Scotland is significantly to the left of England, and the Conservative party (who are commonly referred to as "the Tories", which was what their party was called up until the early 19th century) has very minimal support north of the border--specifically, of the conservative party's 306 MPs, only one holds a scottish seat, the most they've ever held in Scotland since their wipeout in the 1997 general election. To emphasise this point, have a look at the map below, of the last general election:   Look at that sea of blue, stopped entirely at the red belt across central Scotland. That most northerly blue constituency is Galloway and Upper Nithsdale, and that's the only conservative seat in Scotland. As such, many people feel a government by the Conservatives does not represent them, and that the sort of country they want to live in cannot be created while they are shackled to Tory Middle England. There's also a cultural factor. Scotland and England are old enemies in a manner which is mostly expressed innocuously these days--most commonly in the manner of supporting the opposition whenever an English sporting team is competing against someone--but the upshot of that is that while there are certainly plenty of people in Scotland who see themselves as British, nobody sees themself as English and there's a long-standing low level grievance that the English (and international) media tend to see those as being the same thing. It's a minor issue, but nationalist feeling can swell up when our towns are decorated in English flags by "patriotic" corportations seeking to advertise how much they love England whenever England qualifies for a major tournament like the World Cup. It's very easy to overstate how important this is, but it does have an importance, which is why Scotland has an independence movement and the North of England doesn't. The way the two come together is that there's a feeling that a conservative government, largely elected by rural englanders and rich suburbanites from the South East, will govern purely in the interests of England in general and South East England in particular. This is a feeling that is pervasive throughout Scotland, not even just on the part of those who seek Independence, and is arguably a larger part of the reason for the victory of the SNP than an actual majority of Scots suddenly turning in favour of independence outright. I want to expand on this a little and discuss about the major political parties in the UK. Despite Scotland being generally more left wing, we're not talking Venezuela or Cuba here. There certainly is that old strain of hard left socialism running through Scotland, but the SNP are not radical socialists. In fact, one recent article in the Guardian described them as the "last British party", arguing that the other three major parties had essentially taken on American neo-liberal ideals while the SNP had essentially remained true to the postwar consensus of Social Democracy. That's not an analysis I think is fully true (as it downplays the role of Thatcherism in forcing Labour and the Lib Dems to the right, and also downplays some of the neoliberal elements of the SNP), but it does get to the core of the issue, which is that the people of Scotland in general trend more towards wanting Social Democracy at a minimum. This is what parties such as Labour used to represent, and in the years prior to the most recent general election were what the Scottish Liberal Democrats implied they represented too. But the local branches of these parties are essentially beholden to their central offices in England, such that Scottish voters who elected the previous labour government got top level tax reductions and illegal wars, while Lib Dem voters who elected a Liberal MP this time around found that they had indirectly helped the Tories into power. Couple that with the massively ineffectual Ed Milliband and his complete unwillingness or inability to provide a coherent left-wing narrative as an alternative to the current dominant austerity-focused one, and this appears to have been the breaking point for a large number of people leading to the SNP. Expanding on the map above, we can compare the Scottish election results in 2007 against the ones in 2011, one year after the liberal-conservative government came in and Scotland went to the polls. This was the result:   You can see the drop in support for the three major UK-wide parties very clearly here, though it must be mentioned that they picked up a lot of regional seats in the proportional top up. There are two big issues around the whole thing. There's the question of whether Scotland can survive as an indepenent state on its own, and then there's the question of how the referendum ought to be structured. The Referendum This was a large bone of contention between Holyrood and Westminister, especially in the early weeks after the SNP won the election. To boil it down, the referendum the SNP want is this:
What the Unionists want depends on the time of day, the weather, arterial patterns on the livers of sacrificed chickens and such, but has variously included:
Most of these concerns have generally fallen by the wayside, but they pop up from time to time as if they've never been asked before or anwered by the Nationalists. Although this OP focuses mostly on background and procedural topics, the thread is about statistical and factual arguments for and against independence as well. What I'd be very interested to know from anyone following this from further afield is how your own national media are portraying this. Is it mentioned at all? What do they say about us? Comment from everyone is encouraged, but what I'd especially like to see is discussion of articles with facts and figures attached, as opposed to just merely throwing around opinions. They're surprisingly hard to find these days, virtually all the major news coverage has just been "<important person> expressed this opinion" with very few hard facts or analysis. If you have read articles such as these, please post them! Reveilled fucked around with this message at 19:24 on Jun 15, 2012 |
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Jun 15, 2012 18:55
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Interesting things will go here. This pro-nationalist poem may be interesting: Vote Britain This is a good example of the cultural thing I was talking about. Reveilled fucked around with this message at 22:37 on Jun 16, 2012 |
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Jun 15, 2012 18:56
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Fatkraken posted:What is a Scottish citizen as defined by the voting rules, and how is it different from people resident in Scotland? I was born and live in England but I'm a British citizen, as are people in Wales, NI and Scotland. If I or someone like me was to move North of the border, would that make me eligible to vote? What about someone born in Scotland but currently residing elsewhere in the UK? And non UK citizens living in Scotland. I'll update the OP, that was actually poorly phrased on my part. Essentially anyone legally resident in Scotland will be permitted to vote in the referendum under the SNP's plans as long as you are a British, EU, or Commonwealth citizen. So yes, you would be eligible to vote. Scottish expats will not be eligible. Elotana posted:I knew England was to the right of Scotland, but I had no idea it was that stark until I saw the map. The SNP are generally favourable to greater EU integration, and would seek to ensure that upon independence Scotland remains a member of the EU (essentially upgrading its status in the EU from a "region" to a "member state"). As to what would happen afterward, the major parties are all pro-EU, but I don't think we'd looking to join the Euro any time soon or anything like that, though that's just my own speculation.
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Jun 15, 2012 19:23
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ReidRansom posted:I'm normally a bit against countries splitting up unless there are some pretty serious issues in staying put, like on the verge of civil war type stuff, but I've got a soft spot for Scotland. A solid, working class country if ever there was, and also my family comes from up around Inverness, so there's that. I'm having trouble though with some of the logistics. Does it become another commonwealth country like Canada and Australia, or is there some in-between status in mind? EU integration? How to disentangle current ties? Well, the SNP have said that they'd like to keep the Queen as the current head of State, so I would interpret from that that Scotland would become a commonwealth realm. I'm not sure what an in-between status would be if we're talking about an independent state, probably the closest thing to an in-between status would be the "Devolution-max" option where Scotland gains control of its domestic affairs while foreign affairs are left to Westminister, but this would be an extention of the current system without a radical change (though I think this would create larger constitutional hurdles in the long run*). As to how the current ties would be disentangled, there is precedent for that from places like Czechoslovakia and Ireland, and arguably in some ways it is easier for Scotland than for most other nations because many of our institutions are already seperate within the UK (we have our own national health service, our own education system, our own legal system, etc). There are issues like national defence and national debt which would need to be resolved through negotiation prior to independence, of course.. *This is actually probably something worth expanding on. The West Lothian Question Currently, the Parliament at Westminister manages both domestic English affairs as well as affairs relating to the whole of the United Kingdom, Generally when a bill is put before the house, every single member of the House of Commons votes on it. So a change to the Anglo-Welsh education system, for example, would be voted on by MPs from Scotland at the instruction of their parties. The same is not true for a vote on Scottish education, as that would be done at the Scottish Parliament at Holyrood in Edinburgh. So this is the West Lothian Question: Why is an MP from a Scottish constituency (such as West Lothian) permitted to vote on English matters, when an MP from an English consituency is not able to vote of Scottish matters? Now you might think the answer is a very obvious "the Scottish MPs shouldn't be able to vote when the parliament is discussing purely English matters" but it's not as easy as that. Imagine we had a situation where the majority of MPs were Labour, giving us a Labour cabinet and a Labour prime minister. The majority is slim however, and exists only because of Labour's strongholds in South Wales and Central Scotland. This means that when these MPs are not permitted to vote, the party of government may no longer be the largest party. Worse still, the leader of the opposition might actually have a majority of the English MPs! This could mean one party is controlling the passing of things like education and health reform, while a completely different party is in charge of setting the tax rates and other bugetary matters. One possible solution to this is an English parliament, which oversees all domestic matters with appropriate taxation powers and such, while the parliament in Westminister deals only with national matters like defence and foreign affairs. But now you run into another issue, which is that the First Minister of England represents 85% of the population of Great Britain. What will the power dynamic between the English First Minister and the Prime Minister be? If there was a conflict between the two (likely, given that the English Prime Minister would frequently be a Conservative while the British Prime Minister would be a member of the Labour Party), would the prime minister really be percieved to have much in the way of legitimacy? The option the Labour party sought to adopt to resolve the issue was further devolution, the creation of regional assemblies within England to manage local affairs. But the referendum to give one to the North of England failed and the plans were quetly shelved. So right now things are muddling along, but the more power is devolved to Scotland, the worse the problem becomes. An in-between status like devolution-max could very well be setting things up for a constitutional crisis further down the line.
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Jun 15, 2012 20:10
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Konstantin posted:How would an independent Scotland handle currency? Would they continue using the British pound, create a Scottish pound, or go to the Euro? It's difficult to say for certain, as it depends on how independence negotiations go in the event of a yes vote. Moving the the Euro I think would be unlikely, with the current crisis I doubt the Scots would want to join, and the current Eurozone countries probably have too much on their plate right now to properly assess whether Scotland ought to join. Currently in Scotland paper money is not strictly speaking "legal tender", though it is fully accepted in practice, but the consequence of that policy is that several banks in Scotland have licenses to issue paper money which are treated in the exact same way as notes from the Bank of England. So we have the facilites to print our own currency if necessary, but printing a whole new currency would probably be a bit of a hassle to do right at the moment of independence. So this is just my guess, but I think the most likely scenario would be for Scotland to maintain the British Pound Sterling initially while transitioning to a Scottish Pound pegged 1:1 with the Sterling, then at a later date for that peg to be released, switched to peg the Euro, or for Scotland to switch to the Euro depending on the economic performance of Scotland, the rump UK, and the EU. But that's dependent on negotiation, the UK side of an independence negotiation might demand the Pound Sterling be kept, or that Scotland abandon Sterling for another currency. Similarly I think it unlikely by the EU might demand we switch to the Euro at some specified date.
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Jun 15, 2012 23:39
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mediadave posted:What are the current polls regarding independence? Admittedly it's been a couple of years since I left Scotland, but until then they always seemed to be solidly in favour of the Union, by 55-65%. Current polling is in about that region, yes. If the referendum was held today the unionist side would probably win, and that's the primary reason why the unionist parties tried to dictate the referendum to be held as soon as possible, to prevent the possibility of a nationalist campaign that turned that sentiment around. If Scotland voted to remain in the Union I'd be disappointed. While I'm in favour of independence I don't consider myself to be nationalistic. I want to live in a country where I don't have to worry about disabled family members having their livelihoods destroyed by an IT company contracted out to kick disabled people off benefits. I want to live in a country where families of mixed nationality aren't forced apart or forced into exile because the native partner is too poor. I want to live in a country that doesn't go off galavanting into illegal wars that kill thousands of innocent civilians in pursuit of corportate interests, political expediency, or imaginary weapons. Up until the 2010 General Election I believed the UK could be that country, but now I'm convinced I'll never see the UK become that country in my lifetime. I can't say for certain that an Independent Scotland would be that country, but it certainly seems a drat lot more likely. Adar posted:Is Devolution Max basically equivalent to the Channel Islands' (and particularly IOM's) government structure in practice? I'm specifically talking about the islands' status as de facto independent, but theoretically subservient to Parliament. Maybe, but there's a bit more of an issue there in that the Channel Islands and the Isle of Mann are pretty small places, so hands off approaches work pretty well there. They run their own affairs and the UK runs things like foreign policy and national defence for them. Since they are so minor, even if they had a say in these things it would be so minimal that it would not make a difference. But that's not so much the case with Scotland, which is large enough to have potential interests on national defence and foreign policy that may not align with the rest of the UK (fishing rights in the north and norwegian seas would be a big example, as is the nuclear submarines base at Faslane). So presumably Scotland would have to have a say in those areas, but that could create problems if not carefully managed (see The West Lothian Question, above).
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Jun 16, 2012 01:25
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Indeterminacy posted:Something of a tangent here. I'd certainly be more than happy to let the North of England come with us if we were leaving the Union. I very much doubt that such a thing would happen, but I do know it's a topic that's come up in pro-independence circles in the manner of a jokey far-fetched fantasy, and the general consensus whenever I've seen it come up has been that the North [of England] would be welcome to become the South [of Scotland] if they wanted to get away from the folks down in London that badly. But really, it's something that has zero chance of actually happening.
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Jun 17, 2012 01:34
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UN membership, at least, would not be an issue. Other nations which have become independent through an agreed political process (rather than a unilateral declaration) generally join the UN within a few weeks. Slovakia and the Czech republic joined 19 days after their mutual independence, South Sudan joined 5 days after its independence. Whether there'd be a gap in EU membership is a bit less clear, but I would expect an issue like that to be an important aspect of any independence negotiations, and I can't see any reason why the EU would cause barriers to automatic Scottish succession into the status of full membership, and there are compelling reasons why certain member states would want to prevent Scotland leaving the EU, like the Common Fisheries Policy.
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Jun 18, 2012 20:31
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Jedit posted:You have a strange definition of "losing badly". England crushed the Scottish army at the Battle of Falkirk, sent most of the Scottish leaders into exile, and accepted their surrender and homage to the English crown after the capture and execution of William Wallace. It's deemed a Scottish victory because they managed to retain their independence, but that only happened because the English had to respond to a new threat from France before they could consolidate. It's deemed a Scottish victory because the treaty that ended the first war of independence said this: Treaty of Edinburgh-Northampton posted:...We will and grant by these presents, for us, our heirs and successors whatsover, with the common advice, assent and consent of the prelates, princes, earls, barons and the commons of our realm in our Parliament, that the Kingdom of Scotland, within its own proper marches as they were held and maintained in the time of King Alexander of Scotland, last deceased, of good memory, shall belong to our dearest ally and friend, the magnificent prince, Lord Robert, by God's grace illustrious King of Scotland, and to his heirs and successors, separate in all things from the Kingdom of England, whole, free and undisturbed in perpetuity, without any kind of subjection, service claim or demand. And by these presents we denounce and demit to the King of Scotland, his heirs and successors, whatsoever right we or our predecessors have put forward in any way in bygone times to the aforesaid Kingdom of Scotland. And, for ourselves and our heirs and successors, we cancel wholly and utterly all obligations, conventions and compacts undertaken in whatsoever manner with our predecessors, at whatsoever times, by whatsoever Kings or inhabitants, clergy or laity, of the same Kingdom of Scotland, concerning the subjection of the realm of Scotland and its inhabitants. And wheresoever any letters, charters, deeds or instruments may be discovered bearing upon obligations, conventions and compacts of this nature, we will that they be deemed cancelled, invalid, of no effect and void, and of no value or moment. If England won the first war of independence, you sure as hell can't tell it from the treaty they signed to end it. The first war of independence didn't end with William Wallace's death. The first half of the first war ended then, but you don't win a football match just for being 1-0 up at half time.
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Jun 19, 2012 01:20
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Jedit posted:You forgot to quote Scotland's half of the terms: they only got all those things you mentioned if they paid England £20,000. Those terms were placed on the table for no other reason than to get the Scots to go home feeling happy, so England could concentrate on the French. That's why the kingdom of Scotland lay "whole, free and undisturbed in perpetuity" for all of five years before the English came back again. You still haven't explained how this means England won the war. Scotland was independent at the end of the war. The war was fought by England to annex Scotland into the Kingdom of England. This goal was not achieved. In fact Scotland rose up, overthrew the English, defeated them at Bannockburn, successfully invaded Yorkshire and came within a few feet of killing Edward III in the final battle of the war (which Scotland won). But the English won the first war of independence?
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Jun 19, 2012 20:03
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Well, they didn't used to be called the Tartan Tories for nothing! Salmond is a slimy bastard, no doubt about it, and unfortunately he's the only major politician
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Jun 19, 2012 21:34
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Dr Snofeld posted:I think there was a report to that effect on the news today, but I only caught a little bit of it so all I got from it was "drat but Scotland is wet." We are so wet that parts of scotland get 4000mm of precipiation annually and the forests on the western coast are actually classed as rainforests. A Buttery Pastry posted:It's sunny...wait. But really, the political will to really push for it is a big part as well. Better to deal with those challenges before everything turns to poo poo. Most people I would say are apathetic to where their energy comes from, but I'd say most people are receptive to the idea that the energy's just there for us to take it as an inexhaustable reserve much like our water is (though in practise our water's not quite inexhaustable). I think people are generally aware of the Government's message that Scotland stands to benefit a lot from renewables, and when they show up in the news they tend to show up in a positive way, or in a way that makes them seem positive even if the substance of the story is not so--for example, back during Hurricane Bawbag last year there was a bit on the news about them having to turn off all the wind turbines because they were making too much electricity, which came across as "our wind turbines are actually too good". Certainly I don't think Donald Trump's lunatic campaign against them did the idea any harm, the massive loving hissy fit he blew because we built a wind farm next to his private golf course could have powered a few turbines all on its own, and I never met a single person throughout that whole debacle that thought Trump was getting anything other than his just desserts.
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Jun 20, 2012 00:18
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Jedit posted:The details are longer than I'm willing to go into for a derail, but to summarise: while the Scots had won battles they knew they were going to lose the war if it was pressed. That is why in the peace treaty negotiations the English were able to demand that the Scots pay £20,000 - a sum so huge that a special tax had to be levied to pay it - in order to return to the status quo of 1306. If the Scots had been in any kind of superior position they would not have needed to accept those terms, nor would the English have asked for them. Moreover, the only reason the English were negotiating in the first place was because they needed to turn their attentions to the French. By accepting the terms, Scotland abandoned its staunchest ally - not something you do unless supporting them isn't tenable. I know you're desperate to get the last word here, but "England would have won the first war of independence if the war hadn't ended" is not the same as "England won the first war of independence", no more than "The Mongols would have conquered Japan if their fleets hadn't been destroyed by a storm" is the same as "The Mongols conquered Japan". You've been furiously moving the goalposts to try and get out of admitting the fact that your original statement was utterly untrue. Scotland did not lose the First War of Independence. John Charity Spring posted:Yep, wind turbines are great. I absolutely disagree with the nimbyist bollocks that says they ruin landscapes - there's a bunch on the road between Aberdeen and Inverness and they only enhance the landscape. I'm going out to visit a windfarm in a few weeks time. My dad went out a few months ago and said it was quite niice to walk around the park in the shadow of the turbines. I've always rather liked wind turbines myself, and agree they are a boon to the landscape, not a blight.
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Jun 20, 2012 01:30
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Jedit posted:Well, then, I can only offer Scotland my congratulations for being the only nation in history to win a war in which they surrendered and paid reparations. It would have been very impressive if Scotland had actually surrendered, or if the England's goal in the war had been to extort money from Scotland, but that aside we wouldn't be the only nation in history to achieve this. Apparently the USA achieved this feat in the Mexican-American war too, surrendering to the Mexicans and paying them reparations to the tune of 18 million dollars in direct payments and assumed debts. Tithin Melias posted:god I miss home sometimes. The only place on earth that a hurricane would be named after a ballsack. (I realise that's likely not what it was called but it's amusing. ) It actually was called that. I mean, it's official name was Friedhelm, but the papers, councils and politicians all regularly referred to it as Hurricane Bawbag.
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Jun 20, 2012 11:19
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Aethernet posted:Coming from the English side of the border, I'd be really disappointed if you decided to become independent. I've got many Scottish friends, and lived in Edinburgh for a while. I have a strong sentimental attachment to the UK, and in the event of Scottish independence having to show my passport to get on the East Coast line from London to Edinburgh would, to me, be a shame. Well, if it makes you feel better, the last country on the british isles to become independent from the UK does not require British citizens to show a passport on entry, so it's entirely possible (and I would say very likely) that Scotland will remain part of the Common Travel Area upon independence.
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Jun 20, 2012 13:58
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rscott posted:When the whole reason why you're fighting the war is to retain independence, I think it does constitute a victory, and that's why comparing it to the Mexican War is not a very good comparison. IIRC despite all the dumb manifest destiny bullshit prevalent in 19th century American nationalism there wasn't any serious threat to outright Mexican sovereignty. I wasn't comparing Scotland to Mexico, I was comparing Scotland to the US. Both sides achieved their goal in the war. Similarly both Mexico and England failed miserably to achieve their goals and the fact that the other sides paid them some money doesn't turn their loss into a victory. You could certainly argue that Scotland's victory was a phyrric one, but to suggest that they lost a war of independence in which they retained their independence is bonkers. Reveilled fucked around with this message at 18:47 on Jun 20, 2012 |
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Jun 20, 2012 18:39
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Well, in fairness my history lessons in school consisted of Glasgow, the clydebank blitz, the first war of Scottish independence, the viking invasions of Scotland, and the Scottish reformation. I didn't take standard grade history, and so the only non-scottish history I got in school was in higher classics.
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Jun 20, 2012 19:02
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I dislike flower of Scotland for being a bit too mopey. It works okay as a song while Scotland is part of the UK, but I don't think it works as a song for an independent nation given the second verse. My personal preference would be the internationale but barring that I would suggest an enthusiastic reading of Scots Wha Hae with only drums for musical backing. You can get through the whole poem in the usual time alotted for anthems at sporting events, and it sounds much more inspiring than flower of Scotland (when done as a recital instead of the awful slow hymn version at least).
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Jun 22, 2012 12:53
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Jedit posted:Well, now we all know which side you're on. The Internationale is explicitly about people of all nations standing together, as separately they will be destroyed. Yep, and the English can give us a call when they're ready to stand together with the people of all nations!
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Jun 22, 2012 19:38
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Deep Thought posted:So, is this saying that England must be the vanguard country of the revolution? Or the opposite? Communism is so confusing when it's just something tacked onto nationalism. It was a half-joke response to what I hope was a non-serious jab. I'm not a nationalist. I'm no more supportive of Scotland as a national entity than I am of Britain. What I want within the context of the independence debate is tangible social and economic change where I live within my own lifetime, and as far as I can see the best chance I have of getting that is through independence. I'd like for others to share those benefits, but I feel no more obligated to the English than I do any other cultural or national group and the question of whether humanity as a whole is benefitted by the United Kingdom remaining united is something rather ambiguous, so in the absence of compelling evidence to that end, I'm going to stick with advancing the former desire.
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Jun 22, 2012 21:36
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feedmegin posted:Well, yeah, but all the successors hold their position by claiming valid succession from the Stuarts; William III was Charles I's grandson for example. Still counts. But by the same token the claim to the English throne on the part of the Stuarts came by claiming valid succession from the Tudors, James VI of Scotland being Henry VII of England's great grandson. But then, Henry VII was Welsh (in the sense that he was born in Wales, anyway), and his claim derived from being the heir to the Lancastrian branch of the plantagenets (who were from Anjou), who derived their claim through the marriage between Geoffery Plantagenet and Matilda, the grandaughter of William the Conqueror, who was from Normandy. So in a sense, there hasn't been an English dynasty on the throne of England since 1066. But that's kind of a dumb way of looking at it given that most of them considered themselves to be English first and anything else second. My dad does consider himself to be a Jacobite though, on the basis that while he is really a republican he would settle for the current Stuart pretender on the basis of being able to boast about the head of state being a concentration camp survivor. I'll put the summary in the second post tomorrow after making an edit or two if it's OK with you Leggsy.
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Jul 4, 2012 01:46
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Jedit posted:So you post it as "In the event of Scotland being granted independence, this is what will need to happen". I wouldn't respect and definitely wouldn't want a leader who didn't have all the plans for independence in place before the referendum. The problem with this is that independence would come through negotiation, and a part of negotiation means that certain things cannot be decided in advance. Like currency, for example. It's likely that Scotland would continue to use the pound at least in the short term, but that's dependent on a suitable arrangement being worked out with the government of the rump UK in independence negotiations. So it's difficult to say "Scotland would continue to use the pound" because what if Westminster uses that promise as leverage to force an unfair deal on Scotland? Some questions would need to be settled after independence too, like say questions of national defence, things like joining NATO or the size of the armed forces would be something decided at the first scottish general election, and it's rather bizzare to expect the Yes campaign to have an answer to a question like that when after independence is achieved some would be campaigning for an independent Scotland to join NATO and some might be campaigning for it to go the Costa Rica route and just not bother with armed forces. And honestly, settling all the details before you decide if you want to do something in principle just isn't how things work. Couples don't split all their possessions up before they decide whether they're getting a divorce, they decide to divorce and then start splitting their possessions. And by the same token, the Velvet Divorce that split Czechoslovakia was done by agreeing first that the country should be dissolved, and then carrying out negotiations to achieve that. The end of Apartheid in South Africa was done by the white government agreeing to end Apartheid first, and then entering into negotiations with the ANC to achieve that afterward.
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Jul 4, 2012 23:06
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Jinkii posted:What this thread needs is more incredulity about the Scottish National Party being a single issue party. Eh, your heart is in the right place but this comes across as a bit drunkposty or something. Scotland wasn't a colonial power, Nova Scotia was a failed colony that got ceded to France, Stuarts Town got wiped out by the Spanish after two years, and Darien was a collosal failure. Even Latvia did a better job of colonising the Americas than we did. The failure of the venture led to the Act of Union that created Great Britain, but that wasn't the cause of the Stuarts gaining the Scottish and English crowns, and the UK didn't come into being until the second Act of Union in 1801 by which time the House of Hanover was on the throne. I'm not sure what you mean by stirring the genepool, but I don't think the future Scottish prime minister is going to be out having sex with the other heads of government of europe, and even if we end up electing a Scottish Casanova I don't think it has a lot of relevance to the issue of independence.
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Jul 4, 2012 23:49
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SombreroAgnew posted:I wonder if, subsequent to a Scottish departure, there will be any change to the Union Flag. I'd imagine not, but it'll seem a bit silly. Like if half the US states left but they retained all 50 stars.  Bleugh. As far as I'm concerned they can keep the blue bit if it stops them using that...thing.
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Jul 7, 2012 01:33
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Iohannes posted:Actually, it's debatable since some heraldry experts suggest that sable has both aspects of a colour and a metal thus you can have sable on colour or sable on metal without it breaching the rules of heraldry (hence sable eagles on a gules field). Eh, I think if you were including wales in the flag you'd need to counterchange the crosses. You can't just put a yellow fimbration on the cross of St George because then it's a yellow fimbration and not actually an individual aspect of the flag in it's own right (which is why the scottish and irish crosses on the current flag are counterchanged instead of the red cross running down the middle of the diagonals). Following the previous flag's convention that the field is made up of the background of the diagonal flag, you'd want a white field which contained the red Cross of St Patrick, and the red Cross of St George counterchanged with the Cross of St David with a black fimbration on the latter to avoid metal-on-metal. That would give you:  Oh, dear. I have one alternative suggestion based on the fact that officially Wales is a part of the Kingdom of England. Just put the red cross of the Ulster Banner on top of the red cross of St George on a white field. Here, I did a mockup:  I'm rather pleased with this one, I think I found a way for the union flag to not look incredibly ugly without the Scottish bit.
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Jul 8, 2012 02:18
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Iohannes posted:Let me guess you're a libertarian. An agoristic kritarchical panarchist if memory serves me.
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Jul 10, 2012 21:52
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What I would prefer is a development corps of some sort, an army that focused on building houses, roads, wells and things like that. Those things are still valuable for peacekeeping operations, and are also useful in peacetime for government projects like railways, schools and social housing. We would also be teaching young people construction trades like bricklaying and joinery (along with supply chain and logistics stuff for back office staff), while becoming an "officer" would mean learning about engineering instead of mixed unit tactics and stuff like that. I think this would also tie in with the UN's current peacekeeping style of trying to source soldiers from neighbouring countries to the conflict zone. Scots who build wells and can throw up temporary dwellings in place of tents at refugee camps are probably of more use than Scots who shoot guns.
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Jul 12, 2012 12:09
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John Charity Spring posted:As an addendum to my last post, I meant to write a little about the state of the Scots language. Even now, the majority opinion tends to be that it's not actually a separate language, and is simply a 'dialect of English' (even though it's far more accurate to say that both English and Scots are separate divergences of Middle English). A good amount of people still speak Scots but would tend to regard it simply as English, and the education system certainly doesn't acknowledge Scots as a separate language or something worthwhile except in certain higher education contexts, as far as I know. I would quite like to see a more concerted effort to revive Gaelic as a second language throughout Scotland. I know the popular second languages these days are French German and Spanish, and while I can see their use if you go into a job that deals with people from abroad, frankly speaking that's a very small number of people. Not that I want those subjects eliminated, but I think Gaelic ought to have equal footing. As to Scots, I am somewhat ambivalent about it. The distinction between language and dialect is rather arbitrary, and I think it creates more problems than it solves because the "lower-class" nature of it means a great deal of variation in what is considered to be Scots--I'm a glaswegian speaker of Scottish Standard English and I have heard my language described as both English and Scots depending on who I speak to, and the same thing for Glaswegian slang being variously "Scots" and "not Scots". I feel our focus ought to be more against eliminating prejudice against those "lower-class" ways of speaking rather than focusing specifically upon Scots and emphasizing its distinctiveness from English, as I suspect that at best all we would achieve is the creation of a Standard Scots which would then be the prestige dialect with no change for the people speaking the language today. I did get some exposure to Scots in school, incidentally. In primary school we spent half a term of English lessons covering Burns (by which I mean we all had to memorise several poems by rote, of which Scots Wha Hae is the only one I can still recite), and I think we did a few short stories written in Glaswegian in Secondary. Still not very much though. EDIT: this was a phonepost with terrible predictive text errors Reveilled fucked around with this message at 17:14 on Jul 12, 2012 |
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Jul 12, 2012 17:01
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Phlegmish posted:This has probably come up several times in the thread by now, but I skimmed the last few pages and didn't see anyone talk about the level of public support for independence. So I'm going to ask the Scottish posters specifically, do the nationalists actually have a chance of winning the referendum? Support for independence hasn't been the majority opinion in most polls, but the gap is closing somewhat and the SNP have become a very well oiled campaigning machine in recent years. On the part of the nationalists the hope is that an earnest campaign will turn a lot of people on the fence towards independence. That could be for nationalist reasons, but anecdotal I've spoken with a fair few people whose attitude is more of a pragmatic "I don't want to live in a country that elects a government like this" sort of thing. I couldn't quote you any figures on the religious divide but unionism is part and parcel of the radical protestant set, the type that goes on the orange walk and things like that. I couldn't say if support for.Scottish independence would be higher amongst radical Catholics but I would guess that it would. For the non-radical section of the population I am not sure it makes much of a difference. The election maps can be a little misleading because of the political realities of the last few years. The SNP landslide doesn't necessarily indicate a massive turn for independence, more.than anything it represents a rejection of the main Westminster parties. In previous years the highlands were split between the Lib Dems and the SNP so their massive victory there can be primarily put down to the complete collapse of the Lib Dem vote after entering coalition with the conservatives. In the lowlands Labour have the benefit of longstanding tradition of support and deep roots and support networks, but this is predicated upon grounds that are not essentially unionist, so support for labour in elections doesn't by definition mean one is a unionist, just as a vote for the SNP doesn't mean one favours independence, because most campaigns tend to focus on other issues. The Southern Uplands are more Conservative than the rest of Scotland is today, but its perhaps better to look at this in a more historical context to see why. I'll be painting with a broad brush here so there are exceptions to what I am about to write. Before the rise of the SNP you could divide the country into thee political groups: highlanders, who voted liberal; working class lowlanders, who voted labour; and everyone else, who voted Tory. Places like the Southern Uplands and the areas between the cities.of the Central Belt and the highlands themselves tended to vote Conservative whether for being well off or rural protectionist or whatever. The SNP ate into everyone's support so marginal areas were changed by that, and after the disasters of Thatcherism the areas between the lowlands and the Highlands which had been historically conservative began to turn to one of the other three. The area around Carlisle was the only place the Conservatives held on to a majority. I don't think this has much to do with them feeling they have more in common with the English than they do with other Scots, I think it's really just more to do with the historical vagaries of voting politics in the area. People just vote for the party their parents vote for a lot of the time.
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Jul 14, 2012 11:26
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Iohannes posted:The bishops hate it and shout out loudly against it. But then, given that there are about 850,000 Catholics in Scotland and yet only 200,000 attend church regularly, the church is probably not as influential as it thinks it is or would like to be. In my own experience abortion is just one of those issues nobody talks about. I've heard people complain about immigrants, about benefit cheats, the huns, the tims, those lazy layabouts on disability, the gays, but excepting the occasional shouty jesus man in the city centre and one guy waving a sign outside a clinic, I've never heard anybody complain about how the abortionists are murdering children. I do know that catholic schools still teach that abortion (including emergency contraception) is wrong in RE, but it doesn't seem to get much discussion outside of this.
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Jul 27, 2012 01:12
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Etherwind posted:Well, no, it does. Saying you're Catholic or Protestant still identifies you as Christian and monotheistic, and it supposes a certain Christian moral framework to which you at least tacitly subscribe. The only reason you could say it doesn't imply any religious beliefs or practices is because you hold these things to be the default, background neutrality (they aren't). Speaking as a Glaswegian where the catholic / protestant divide is arguably at its most stark, I have known a great number of people who consider themselves catholic or protestant while not even believing in god. And as someone else said, I have heard people describe themselves as "half-catholic and half-protestant" because their parents came from either side. Growing up I used to call myself a "lapsed catholic" because that was what my mum called herself. Except, I have never even been baptized much less had a confirmation, so I am a catholic in no religious sense, not even catholic enough to have actually lapsed from the faith. On my mum's part, she doesn't consider herself religious any more or go to church, but still strongly desired to send my little sister to the catholic girls school. Catholic and protestant in my experience, at least here in Glasgow, is a bit like being Jewish, in that you can be one even if you are willing to openly mock the preachers in the city centre for believing in god.
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Jul 28, 2012 20:23
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GuestBob posted:With four of the world's oldest Universities being in Scotland I would like to think a solid education system was just luck. I mean, I know that the Ancients weren't always as good as they are now but they were the dissenters alternative to Oxbridge for a long time. I think by lucking into it Iohannes meant that any individual Scot only benefits from Scotland's education by the sheer luck of being Scottish, and that its a little silly to be proud of something you most likely had virtually no part in building. Generally I'd agree with that sentiment but I do make an exception for pride in the quality of public services as it really only takes a few years of people not giving a poo poo for thousands of years of work to be demolished. And funding of public services is a communal effort, so I would say they are something any person has a right to be proud of those things provided you don't then turn around and vote to have services slashed. Reveilled fucked around with this message at 09:43 on Jul 29, 2012 |
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Jul 29, 2012 09:33
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Iohannes posted:United Kingdom of one kingdom? The Irish throne was subsumed into that of the English one by the Pope and Wales was never a Kingdom. So the United Kingdom of one kingdom and one principality? Which pope are we talking about? The Papal Bull of 1155 just granted Henry II permission to invade the island, and the Lordship of Ireland wasn't converted into a Kingdom until eight years after Henry VIII's conversion to Protestantism. The papal bull of 1555 as I understand it only recognised that Mary I was rightful Queen of Ireland. I don't see that independence for Scotland would mean a dissolution of the UK. The United Kingdom is the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland, not the United Kingdom of England and Scotland. If the independence of the Republic of Ireland didn't dissolve the UK, I don't see that the independence of Scotland would either. I'd bank on a name change to something like The United Kingdom of Southern Great Britain and Northern Ireland. And building on what Install Gentoo said, there currently is only one kingdom in our current state, and that's the United Kingdom. See, for example, the text of the Acts of Union: Act of Union of 1707, Article 1 posted:THAT the two Kingdoms of Scotland and England shall upon the first day of May next ensuing the date hereof, and for ever after, be united into One Kingdom by the Name of GREAT BRITAIN; And that the Ensigns Armorial of the said United Kingdom be such as Her Majesty shall appoint,, and the Crosses of St Andrew and St George be conjoined, in such manner as Her Majesty shall think fit, and used in all Flags, Banners, Standards and Ensigns, both at Sea and Land. Act of Union 1800, Article 1 posted:That it be the first article of the union of the kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland, that the said kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland shall, upon the first day of January which shall be in the year of our lord one thousand eight hundred and one, and for ever after, be united into one kingdom, by the name of “the united Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland”; and that the royal stile and titles appertaining to the imperial crown of the said united kingdom and its dependencies, and also the ensigns, armorial flags and banners thereof, shall be such as his Majesty, by his royal proclamation under the great seal of the united kingdom, shall be pleased to appoint. On May 1, 1707, the Kingdoms of England and Scotland ceased to exist, and on January 1, 1801, the Kingdoms of Ireland and Great Britain ceased to exist.
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Oct 12, 2012 13:14
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Iohannes posted:I'm not entirely sure how your point addresses what you quoted. I never said that the UK was a dual state. It is a single state, which is my point (hence my marriage analogy). It is a single state formed by a union of two states. If one of those states exits then the union ceases to exist. If the union ceases to exist then the body politic that was created by that union must also cease to exist. As you point out, yes the UK will probably continue with the same name, but the UK post Scottish independence is, by dint of the end of the union of Parliaments not the same UK post-1707. Great Britain as a state did not exist prior to the union of England and Scotland and cannot exist when that union ceases. The Act of Union of 1707 didn't create the United Kingdom. It created the Kingdom of Great Britain, a state that ceased to exist in 1801 when the United Kingdom was created. The Kingdom of Scotland was not in any way involved in the creation of the United Kingdom, having ceased to exist 94 years prior to the creation of the United Kingdom. Scotland's independence wouldn't be dissolving the UK any more than Ireland's independence did.
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Oct 15, 2012 00:49
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esquilax posted:What an ironic reply in a thread named after a poem about the events in Braveheart. No it isn't.
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Oct 22, 2012 09:43
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