Each of us is a British ambassador

Every now and again on Twitter a Scottish nationalist contacts me with pictures of a demonstration that took place in Glasgow sometime soon after the Scottish independence referendum in 2014. The pictures involve some Glaswegians behaving badly. They carry Union Flags and are clearly involved in some sort of disorder. Some of them are making far right gestures. I always point out that such pictures suggest West of Scotland sectarianism rather than anything to do with the rest of Scotland. Where I live in Aberdeenshire, no-one knows or cares whether someone else is a Catholic or Protestant. The idea of voting because of religion strikes the vast majority of Scots as something out of the Middle Ages. Nevertheless it is important to realise that years after this misbehaviour in Glasgow, Scottish nationalists feel they can use it to help their cause. Those foolish people misbehaving in Glasgow might have been waving Union flags, but they were harming the UK and helping those who want to destroy it by means of Scottish independence.

The Pro UK side of the argument has an advantage. We don’t have the equivalent of Cybernats, neither online nor on the streets. I can’t remember a huge Pro UK mob picketing an SNP conference or the BBC. Nicola Sturgeon has never been chased by a mob in Edinburgh, nor was Alex Salmond. It was Jim Murphy who was confronted by a foul mouthed mob while he tried to put forward reasoned argument. When someone from the SNP speaks in public they are allowed to do so in peace. No large Pro UK crowd will even turn up let alone attempt to shout them down.

Online the situation is if anything worse. Pro UK people regularly are attacked by foul mouthed nationalists for simply expressing an opinion that they disagree with. What is frightening is that on occasions these mobs can be overwhelming. Suddenly you find your timeline filled with hundreds, sometimes thousands of Scottish nationalists saying the most insulting things imaginable. These people have succeeded in driving some Pro UK people from Twitter.

At some points it gets so bad that I take the rather drastic step of blocking Scottish nationalists en masse. I simply go down my timeline and block everyone whose picture suggests they support the SNP. It's a pity, but it works and enables me to use Twitter in peace.

There is no equivalent to this on the Pro UK side. There are some Pro UK people who say stupid things, but they are isolated individuals.

The important point to realise is that the Scottish nationalist extremists who become mobs on the street or mobs online damage the SNP. The sort of people who vandalised Pro UK signs in the street in 2014 didn’t help the cause of Scottish independence they harmed it. An angry mob whether online or on the street is not a vote winner. It’s a vote loser.

For the most part Pro UK people I come across behave well. We all sometimes say or write stupid things. We all sometimes lose our tempers. But try to always remember that by expressing support for the UK you represent our country. By behaving well you make it more likely that moderate Scottish voters will continue to support the UK and reject Scottish independence.

I have a general policy of not debating to any great extent with obviously committed Scottish nationalists. I will make one or two comments and then leave it. There is no point having long debates with people who won’t change their minds. I will try to be polite, but if I get any sort of insult, I will politely but immediately block them. I consider words like “yoon” and “British nationalist” to be insults. There is no point replying with an insult. Instead simply block and the problem is solved.

I use polemic in my writing and I try to point out what I think is the hidden truth involving Scottish nationalism. My style of writing is always to try look at issues in an unusual way. Sometimes in the hundreds of thousands of words I have written I may misjudge something. That is the nature of writing articles that try to be original. But I don’t make lurid and obviously false claims about our opponents. If I did it would help their cause and damage mine.

Sometimes I see Pro UK people who use sectarian language or who describe the SNP as Nazis. These people are helping the SNP and making Scottish independence more likely. It’s ludicrously false to describe Nicola Sturgeon as a Nazi. I try to follow back everyone on Twitter. It's only polite.  But I tend to simply ignore people who make our side look bad. Having a profile picture of Sturgeon mocked up to look like Hitler is the equivalent of Scottish nationalists burning the Union Flag. Likewise ranting and swearing about the SNP might give you a moment’s pleasure, but it hurts the Pro UK cause. The same goes for any sort of sectarianism.

Sectarianism is deeply unpopular in most of Scotland. The vast majority of us have no time whatsoever for either side of this divide. If you are motivated by sectarianism you would be far better keeping silent. Most Scots whether we support independence or oppose it want nothing to do with sectarianism. It horrified me when the Orange Order decided to march prior to the vote in 2014. It cost the Pro UK side votes.

Our task is always to reach out to moderate people and the undecided. The best way to do this is to make clear, rational arguments and to do so in as polite a way as possible. Treat our opponents with respect. We are all Scots. Disagree forcefully with them by all means, but don’t attack them personally. It is to our good fortune that a large number of pro-independence people behave badly. Let them do so, but don’t join in. If we can show that the Pro UK side of the argument is the more reasonable because we behave better, we will have a far better chance to defeat the SNP in any future election. 

The positive view of the SNP is only shared by insiders

Every now and again I read an account from one of the nationalist intellectuals that describes the SNP and the other parties that form the “Yes alliance” in the most positive, glowing terms. Naturally, everyone likes to describe their own politics in this way, but the description can appear rather odd to those of us who do not share these political prejudices. Scottish nationalism is portrayed by some of its intellectuals as the most positive, liberal, friendly mix of idealistic young activists hoping to change the world into a better place through the sheer force of their own goodness. Civic nationalism is described in terms that make it appear to be the heir to both Gandhi and Mandela. Nationalist meetings are  depicted as some sort of combination of the Liberals and the Greens all wearing sandals and eating mung beans coming up with ever more creative ways to make the world more virtuous. If only the whole world followed the doctrines of civic nationalism, we’d have world peace, an end to poverty, peace and goodwill among men and, of course, women.

This may well be the experience of civic nationalism from within.  I have no idea, because I am not within. Perhaps, there are these groups of eager young civic nationalist intellectuals trying to bring paradise to Scotland, Britain, Europe and tomorrow, the world. But this insider view is not shared by anyone who is not on the inside.

I have already argued extensively elsewhere that civic nationalism is itself an intellectual sham. That is not to say that civic nationalists are insincere. They are all too sincere, but they are mistaken. Why distinguish between that which is the same? Why distinguish between people in the UK if there is no distinguishing mark by which you can legitimately separate them. Without the sense of nationalism that is far from civic, that I am Scottish and this is the mark that distinguishes me from all the world, civic nationalism could not get off the ground. It is built on the foundation of difference and though it puts a mask on this foundation that enables the intellectuals to eat their mung beans, the mask not infrequently slips.

If the SNP is such a positive, liberal, charming force for good, why is it that so many people fear it? For many people in Scotland, even, perhaps, for half the people of Scotland there is nothing worse than the SNP. They have supplanted the Tories as the party that others vote tactically against. It didn’t work this time. Not enough of us voted in this way, the No vote remains divided apart from at a referendum, but it is obvious that while the SNP has become more popular amongst a part of the Scottish population, it has become much, much less popular amongst another part. A party which opponents are willing to gang up on is not obviously the party described by the nationalist intellectuals. Why vote tactically against such virtue and such goodness?

Scotland has become an extraordinarily divided society. Some people think we have not been this divided since the 17th century. Part of the Scottish population wants independence more than anything else in the world, but an equal or I suspect, still greater part, passionately does not want independence. The only issue in Scottish politics is independence. Only this issue could have destroyed the Labour party. The SNP and Scottish Labour have for the most part similar policies. The SNP may portray itself as somewhat more left wing, but the issue that divided these two parties like a chasm is nothing that what is in the SNP manifesto, rather it’s the SNP’s goal of independence. The biggest problem for the SNP in portraying itself to opponents in a positive way is that for No voters there is nothing remotely positive about breaking up our country. For all the liberal progressive spin, this one policy will always make the SNP appear as extremists to people like me.

We have a set of political problems in the UK like poverty, inequality, living within our means and the attempt to find economic growth. I can think of no more extreme policy to deal with any of these issues than the one of breaking up a 300 year old country. What SNP supporters don’t get is that to those of us who care about both Scotland and the UK, this threat is painful. It is completely horrible to us to imagine that we would no longer live in the UK. No nice sweet words from Nicola Sturgeon can in any way diminish this horror. Don’t fear us, she says, but this is because she wants to create the conditions for independence by stealth. The population of every other country in the world would rightly fear those who threaten the territorial integrity of their country. Yet, we like cattle before slaughter, are supposed not to fear it as soothing words take us along the path.

Many Scots are quietly making plans to leave Scotland if the SNP ever get their dream of independence. This is not merely because we don’t much want to live in a nation dominated by nationalists with policies that are liable to make us poorer. Rather, we would prefer to leave the country of our birth than live in an independent Scotland. The usual nationalist response to this is a form of good riddance. Fair enough, but Scotland is liable to lose some of its best talent if it goes down that route. No voters are disproportionately to be found in many of the jobs that Scotland needs most. Our absence would tend to leave a gap.

This feeling that it might be time to leave is especially felt by English people who have come to live in Scotland. Of course, this feeling is not shared by everyone. Lots of English people love the SNP. It is one way to fit in. It’s also, I suspect, one way to keep harmony in a household where one partner votes SNP. Suddenly, by supporting the SNP everyone is so nice. Wearing a little yellow thistle means no-one any longer makes snide comments about the football or about the poshness of your accent. You’re one of us now. What’s not to like? But still this is a minority experience amongst our largest “immigrant group.”

It is not accidental that the vast majority of English people living in Scotland voted No. They had no desire to be turned into foreigners in their own land. Moreover, as they frequently tell me, they have seen Scotland change in the past 20-30 years. Where once was a land that was at peace with itself, here now is a land that is divided and frequently hostile. Look at the online reaction to English people asking questions in one of the debates. What has it to do with you, you’re English, was the typical response. Again this may not be the impression from inside, but it is the impression from outside. Many English people in Scotland are genuinely afraid of Scottish nationalism. They don’t think they would have any place at all in a country that they think would have been founded on the age old hostility to them.  The fact that the SNP can point to a tiny proportion of English people who have as it were become more Scottish than the Scots does not change this fear. There are littered throughout history examples of self-hatred, and people trying desperately to fit in. These examples are not always as positive as they might at first seem.

There are two prejudices that blight Scotland: Anglophobia and Sectarianism. These are not confined to Yes voters or No voters. To a lesser or greater extent they are a feature of all of us.  Prejudice is not someone else’s problem, it is my problem for which of us is without some prejudice or other? The perception, however, is that Anglophobia and, to a lesser extent, sectarianism underpins some of the support for Scottish nationalism. It is, without doubt, not felt by the intellectuals, but there is more than enough evidence that it is felt by some of the foot soldiers. Scotland defines itself as not being England and low level hostility about our nearest neighbour is something we learn at our mother’s knee. I have felt this, you, too, have felt this, but would we even be thinking about separating ourself from our nearest neighbour if we did not feel it?  Which of us has not said something unkind about England or the English that we would not dream about saying about any other country or people? I have, I confess it. But I wish that this had not been a part of my upbringing, I wish none of us had made jokes about the English, for if 30 and 40 years ago there had been no such banter in Scotland, our place in the UK would now be absolutely secure. It is the seed of difference that has grown into 56 SNP MPs and a significant part of the population that doesn’t think it is from the country stamped on its passport. We are, all of us, both Yes and No voters, equally guilty for what has happened to our country.

The SNP has an image problem. They were so feared in parts of England that they drove huge numbers of people to vote for the Conservatives who otherwise would not have done so. The most disastrous result of all was seen as a Labour government propped up by the SNP. If the SNP were as their intellectuals portray them, why do so many people fear them? #SNPout did not work particularly well in Scotland this time, but it worked a dream in England. They voted to keep the #SNPout.

The SNP have destroyed the Labour party in Scotland. They have pretty much destroyed it in England, too. May I suggest that this is not exactly progressive. The SNP is not really a Left wing party at all. Nationalist politics is rather like Abraham Lincoln’s attitude to slavery. If the SNP could achieve independence by being Left Wing, they would do that, if they could achieve it by being Centrist, they would do that, and if they could achieve it by being Right Wing, they would do that also. Their aim is independence and whatever combination of Left, Right, Centre, plus a dash of populism that gets them to their goal, will be embraced. The SNP have been a right wing party before when it suited them, and no doubt there are still some right wingers in the party willing to accept any amount of socialism if only it gets them independence. Much of what is progressive in the UK came about because of the Labour Party. Those who are responsible for destroying the Labour party in Scotland and replacing it with a nationalist party should be very careful when they describe themselves as progressives. It doesn’t look that way from the outside.

SNP intellectuals may portray the party as progressive, liberal and kindly, but that is not how it appears to those of us who oppose it. We not infrequently are opposed by the mob and by foul mouths that are neither civic, nor civil. If every SNP supporter was as reasonable and sensible as some of those writing in newspapers, then these claims might not appear quite so ludicrous. But Scotland, in fact, is a country where No voters don’t dare put posters in their windows, where we don’t talk about politics with those we don’t know, where friendships and families are lost because of political disagreement and where men suddenly appear out of nowhere to shout abuse in the face of the leader of the Scottish Labour party. I campaign online. I can count on the fingers of one hand the SNP supporters who I trust and who always appear reasonable, liberal and civil, the rest sometimes portray themselves as friendly at first, but in the end, most commonly attack relentlessly and  in the foulest most abusive way possible.  It might be an idea to clean up your own house before pretending how nice it is.  We can see what Scottish nationalism consists of.  No other party, except those on the extremes, has supporters like the SNP. I wouldn’t vote for them even if I supported independence, for fear that I would be tainted by the very act of voting.

If you like my writing, you can find my books Scarlet on the Horizon, An Indyref Romance and Lily of St Leonards on Amazon. Please follow the links on the side. Thanks. I appreciate your support.