Where does Dennis the Menace come from? He was
initially created by DC Thomson in Dundee. But later the character has appeared
in animated films made in London. The UK Government advertised this with a
picture of the animated version of Dennis saying it came from London. This was
met with fury by various Scottish nationalists. One called it cultural
appropriation.
But this is odd for a variety of reasons. Where does
Winnie the Pooh come from? You could argue One Hundred Acre Wood, or wherever
A.A. Milne was living or the place he based it on. You could argue that it was from
London as it was first published by Methuen & Co. Ltd., but this would be a
bit strange. We don’t normally think a book is from its place of publication or
indeed from where it was written. This would have the unfortunate consequence
of making lots of Scottish books English if they happened to be published by
Penguin.
But let’s say we are thinking about an animated
version of Winnie the Pooh produced by Disney in Hollywood. Would it be wrong
to say that this version of the story came from somewhere in Los Angeles? No
obviously not. It was animated there. The voices and the music would have been
recorded there. Would anyone call a Disney Winnie the Pooh cultural appropriation?
Well, if you did you would have to call the animated version of Snow White and
the Seven Dwarfs and almost every other animated Disney film cultural appropriation
too.
Even to think of an animated version of Dennis the
Menace being truly described as being from London as cultural appropriation
shows the oddness of SNP ideas about what it is to be Scottish. Cultural
appropriation is the idea that it is wrong for white people to adopt aspects of
an ethnic minority culture or dress. Thus, some black people might criticise
white people for wearing dreadlocks or trying to imitate reggae. But no one
thinks that it is cultural appropriation for someone from the north of Germany
to wear Bavarian national dress. They are from the same race.
Until quite recently there was the idea that only people
who could trace their ancestry to a particular clan were entitled to wear a
kilt with that pattern. But now no one objects to Humza Yousaf wearing a kilt. Students
from many countries will wear kilts at their graduation. No one will object if someone
from London learns to play the bagpipes and plays them dressed in full highland
regalia every day in Trafalgar Square.
The idea that being Scottish is open to everyone from
any country and every race and that every symbol and cultural aspect of
Scotland is equally open to them becomes senseless if English people can be
guilty of cultural appropriation. It looks then as if Scottish culture can be
adopted by anyone except England.
But what is on view here displays the contradiction inherent
in Scottish nationalism.
Dennis the Menace may have been created in Dundee, but
he is not obviously from Dundee. DC Thomson produced comics like the Broons and
Oor Wullie where the characters were obviously from Scotland, but it wanted a
wider audience for most of its comic characters, who are not obviously from anywhere.
If Dennis the Menace were from Dundee, he would speak like a Dundonian, but he
doesn’t.
No one cares where Marvel comics were produced or argues
that Superman and the Incredible Hulk are from New York because these comics
were produced there. But Scottish nationalists are incredibly touchy and possessive
about Scottishness while arguing that it is open to everyone.
What is it to be a Scot? The SNP thinks that anyone living
in Scotland is a Scot. It isn’t necessary to be born in Scotland. It isn’t necessary
to have any Scottish ancestors. It isn’t even necessary to speak English, Scots
or Gaelic. It is perfectly possible for instance for a new Scot to live in
Scotland and know nothing whatsoever about Scottish history, culture, language
or indeed anything else.
If the SNP achieved independence it would like to
increase immigration. Everyone who arrived in Scotland would be as Scottish as
someone else who could trace his ancestry back to Bannockburn.
But the contradiction is this. Scottish nationalists
are obsessed with the past and with Scottish culture. This is why they play
bagpipes when they go on marches and why they wear Jacobite hats with white
cockades and highland dress. It is also why they are obsessed with finding and
emphasising anything that makes Scotland different from England. This includes
a desperate search for a different language.
But the truth is that we don’t normally wear highland
dress or play bagpipes. Almost all Scots speak English with an accent. Some of
us sometimes add a few Scottish words. We are culturally almost identical to
the other parts of the UK.
But why go to such extraordinary lengths to pretend
that we are different if we are willing to accept people as equally Scottish just
because they have recently arrived here. If what matters is that we wear kilts
and play bagpipes and use words that are either Scottish or Gaelic, then how
can this be reconciled with Scottishness applying equally to someone who speaks
neither English, Scottish, nor Gaelic?
If being Scottish is merely being resident in a place
called Scotland, then depending on where these new Scots originally came from,
they could be culturally and linguistically very similar indeed to people
living in England who came from the same place. But why separate people who are
the same?
The Scottish nationalist argument depends both on
there being a Scottish people that is a different people from those living in other
parts of the UK and that being Scottish has nothing whatsoever to do with where
you were born and where your parents came from. But it cannot be both.
But if there is no such thing as a Scottish people,
then Scottish nationalism and its goal are senseless. If on the other hand
there is such a thing as a Scottish people, then it must depend on who your
parents and ancestors are.
Dennis the Menace is no more Scottish because he was
produced in Dundee than Winston Smith is Scottish because Orwell wrote 1984
while living on Jura. Fictional characters don’t have a nationality. They are
from nowhere. But the obsession with the supposed Scottishness of Dennis the
Menace reveals that Scottish nationalists are obsessed with the origin or each
person. Dennis the Menace can’t be from London, because his origin is Dundee. That
is his ancestry.
That is also why people who cannot trace their
ancestry to Bannockburn and who do not speak fluent Scots or Gaelic should be
very careful voting for the SNP. Scottish nationalists may pretend that you are
Scots just like they are, but they don’t quite think you are entitled to wear a
kilt. It’s cultural appropriation.
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