The New Fat Scotland 'Thanks for all the Fish' Thread.

Leanne1812

.string. wrote: »

A bit of retrospection:


1. I was rather shocked by the reaction to mollycat's post #2172 which I found a touching and anquished cry from someone who percieves her country being torn apart by events and arguments she sees as false.

Instead of addressing the concerns she expressed, the response was
"Wee sleekit timorous beastie" and the implication that the disgusting poster from UKIP was representative of the UK.

Later comments included the assertion that child abuse was at the heart of the UK establishment, and other distorted remarks unworthy of a response.

2. On the matter of racialism, xenophobia:
I don't call the people posting here on behalf of iScitland or Brexit, as being Racist simply because Racism is more about different genetic ethnicity. A matter of definition .

But I do charge both Brexit and Scottish Nationalists as having a large element of Xenophobia in their attitudes and argumentation. I think that based on the expressed attitudes behind such phrases as "Regain Control". Both sets of people accompany such slogans be claiming that the institutions of the respective Unions do not and cannot take decisions which take into proper account the interests of, respectively, the UK or Scotland. The argumentation always ignores the effect that engagement by UK or Scottish politicians in that process and demonises the EU / the UK in the process. Small wonder that the English feel insulted as, no doubt, do Europeans.

It's a xenophobic attitude, a recourse of fanaticism everywhere from Islamic State to football hooligans, and one I despise.

Now one could add all the fluffy stuff about not everyone in the Leave or Yes Campaigns being so-minded, but my concern is well founded I think and not actually controversial.

What is maybe more controversial is that I think that the SNP has institutionalised xenophobia (of the UK/British/English) in their policies.

I don't quite know how to respond to this string but I'll try.

I see little comparison between brexiteers and Yes voters. On regaining control isn't that about Brussels/Westminster making decisions that both sides would rather have themselves? How that transfers into xenophobia I'm just not getting it?

I can empathise with Mollycat and those with an emotional attachment to the union but I don't agree. I have a good friend with very similar views to Molly who has told me even if he was £1 million a year better off he'd still vote No. So, there are some who are set in their views who will never change. We had a good few very heated chats in the run up in 2014 but remain good friends to this day. He & I bore our other friends as we enjoy debate & political chat that the others don't so much. What I'm trying to say is we can all still be friends/neighbours & allies even though we hold very different views.

When it comes to decision making you could say our small country and its representatives can so easily be disregarded and overruled as was shown recently with the Trident vote. It's easy to say well, that's democracy, everyone has the vote but when the Scottish vote seems to represent nothing you can surely see how it fosters the view that we'd be better off making our own decisions.

I strongly disagree that the SNP has institutionalised xenophobia at its heart. Which policies appear to show this?

.string.

Leanne1812 wrote: »

I don't quite know how to respond to this string but I'll try.

I see little comparison between brexiteers and Yes voters. On regaining control isn't that about Brussels/Westminster making decisions that both sides would rather have themselves? How that transfers into xenophobia I'm just not getting it?
........
When it comes to decision making you could say our small country and its representatives can so easily be disregarded and overruled as was shown recently with the Trident vote. It's easy to say well, that's democracy, everyone has the vote but when the Scottish vote seems to represent nothing you can surely see how it fosters the view that we'd be better off making our own decisions.

I strongly disagree that the SNP has institutionalised xenophobia at its heart. Which policies appear to show this?

OK - I'll try to elaborate.


From the Brexit argumentation, the EU commission was seen and portrayed as unelected bureaucrats (which they are) who impose laws on the UK which have no political mandate in the UK (which is not true because those laws/standards are mandated in areas by the Council and therefore signed off by each country and, as drafts, are modified and must be approved by both the European Parliament and the Council).

Further the "EU" cannot be trusted to have the interests of the UK at heart and do not (it was claimed that is was rarely) agree proposals from the UK.

That distrust of non-UK people was a xenophobicattitude area because it originates from not trusting foreigners to make anything but selfish decisions).

So it comes down to an unwillingness to work with others for the common interest.


I phrased that in terms of the Brexit campaign so as to not raise your hackles - I'm sure you can see a parallel with the SNP stance.

On the last para of your post I would respond that the SNP approach dwells continually on denigrating Westminster, which is why I wrote that it is institutionalised.

Rinoa

baldelectrician wrote: »

• Westminster was running the show when THEY failed to properly regulate the banks.

If Scotland had been an independent country and Gordon Brown had been Scottish Prime Minister/President, would you still have blamed Westminster?

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

baldelectrician wrote: »

Guess where almost of the off shore revenue is allocated (clue: NOT Scotland).

False.

When you go to a supermarket here (with a head office outside Scotland) the revenues are allocated outside Scotland, thus skewing the figures, this adversely allocates £4bn-£6bn per year.

False.

GERS allocates economic activity by location - NOT by location of the head office.

Add to this our share of the UK debt interest (£4bn)

Which we'll still have.

plus our undespend on defence (£1.5bn) .

You can't include an underspend as a.... Oh never mind.

This is before you take into account the excise duty on exported whisky (over 80% is allocated outside Scotland as the container ships leave from Dover etc) then you have another £2bn

So mind numbingly false I don't quite know where to start.

Lets leave that one with a simple fact.

There is NO excise duty on exported whisky.

Look.... I was a No voter last time around but I'd reluctantly vote Yes if it was the only way to stay in the EU..... But you're not going to win over people like me by continuing to lie about the economics of it all.

Just admit you were wrong and come up with an actual plan to cut spending and deal with the black hole.

TrickyTree83

baldelectrician wrote: »

I stongly disagree that we are heavily subsidised, my twopenneth ;
There are 5 areas revenue is allocated in the UK,
Scotland
England
Wales
Northern Ireland
Other
Guess where almost of the off shore revenue is allocated (clue: NOT Scotland).

It's not about the oil (Scotlands GDP per person WITHOUT oil is 99% of the rUK figures).

Scotlands economy dropped less that £300m after the drop in oil price


When you go to a supermarket here (with a head office outside Scotland) the revenues are allocated outside Scotland, thus skewing the figures, this adversely allocates £4bn-£6bn per year.
Add to this our share of the UK debt interest (£4bn) plus our undespend on defence (£1.5bn) .
This is before you take into account the excise duty on exported whisky (over 80% is allocated outside Scotland as the container ships leave from Dover etc) then you have another £2bn


So a 'defecit' of £13 bn comes in at an evens status or a small surplus before we actually see the real books.


I reckon there will be more than a few pleasant surprises post indy when we actually find out where our money is going

Evidence, evidence, evidence, evidence.

Without that it's just talk and feelings.

As Hamish has said, it's all been debunked, and the values are false.

To all the Scottish pro-indy supporters on here - can you actually see now how deluded some of the pro-indy people are? Clearly the majority on here are more well informed which is perhaps why we don't get into the pro-indy economics. But posters such as this reflect a large part of what is seen on WoS blog and twitter feed and related facebook posts.

As I said before, a mis-informed Scottish indy voter is a bad indy voter. Worrying stuff.

Shakethedisease

.string. wrote: »

A bit of retrospection:


1. I was rather shocked by the reaction to mollycat's post #2172 which I found a touching and anquished cry from someone who percieves her country being torn apart by events and arguments she sees as false.

Instead of addressing the concerns she expressed, the response was
"Wee sleekit timorous beastie" and the implication that the disgusting poster from UKIP was representative of the UK.

I was answering Tricky with his inevitable shock and horror that anyone would consider ALL Leave voter's to be xenophobic and racist. Making the simple point that much of the same is put at the doors of independence/SNP voters. In fact it happens regularly here. It most definitely is, low brow and lazy discussion when one simply reduces things down to those sort of levels. I was actually making the same point as you.

and the implication that the disgusting poster from UKIP was representative of the UK

It's not of course. But then neither are the constant and disgusting repetitions of 'driven by anti English feeling' justified nor representative of vast swathes of Scots voters either. My point was quite clear.

Also when one starts a post with 'och aye the noo' and goes on to talk about 'guddle yer troots' , what better way to respond in kind than with the undoubted master and genius of Old Scots, Robert Burns himself with one of his most famous poems. :T

Later comments included the assertion that child abuse was at the heart of the UK establishment, and other distorted remarks unworthy of a response.

2. On the matter of racialism, xenophobia:
I don't call the people posting here on behalf of iScitland or Brexit, as being Racist simply because Racism is more about different genetic ethnicity. A matter of definition .

But I do charge both Brexit and Scottish Nationalists as having a large element of Xenophobia in their attitudes and argumentation. I think that based on the expressed attitudes behind such phrases as "Regain Control". Both sets of people accompany such slogans be claiming that the institutions of the respective Unions do not and cannot take decisions which take into proper account the interests of, respectively, the UK or Scotland. The argumentation always ignores the effect that engagement by UK or Scottish politicians in that process and demonises the EU / the UK in the process. Small wonder that the English feel insulted as, no doubt, do Europeans.

It's a xenophobic attitude, a recourse of fanaticism everywhere from Islamic State to football hooligans, and one I despise.

Now one could add all the fluffy stuff about not everyone in the Leave or Yes Campaigns being so-minded, but my concern is well founded I think and not actually controversial.

What is maybe more controversial is that I think that the SNP has institutionalised xenophobia (of the UK/British/English) in their policies.

I disagree. There's a huge difference between campaigns that begin and end with taking back control of physical borders. And taking back control of one's political destiny ( while leaving the borders open to all ).

Labour historically were in fact no more fans of Westminster than the SNP are when the Tories are in power.

Many chart Labour's downfall in Scotland from their 2007 defeat or even the referendum campaign in 2014. To find the roots of Labour's implosion, one must look further into the past to the Thatcher era.It was at this time that Scottish Labour unleashed the arguments of a 'democratic deficit', that Scotland was being governed by an illegitimate foreign government. Those who believe in a political union between Scotland and England cannot argue against the legitimacy of the Westminster government. Sovereignty is not a pick 'n' mix arrangement in which Westminster is sovereign only when UK Government policy is deemed to benefit Scotland. It was, and remains, sovereign in all matters.
The intellectual arguments which constructed the 1989 Claim of Right, signed by all Scottish Labour MPs bar one, asserted that "...the Union has always been, and remains, a threat to the survival of a distinctive culture in Scotland."
Scottish Labour was prepared to hack away at the political underpinning which upheld the Union they professed to love all for the sake of a few more votes. This was kamikaze unionism.

..Yet it is this same party which now points to the SNP and sneers that they have a "Westminster grievance obsession". Where do they think the SNP learned it?

http://stv.tv/news/politics/1345988-scottish-labour-have-no-one-to-blame-but-themselves-for-their-decline/

The seeds of where we all are now go back far beyond the SNP's rise to Holyrood and Westminster more recently. And I can assure you, that it's always Westminster centric in nature. There is no need for any English person to feel insulted.

So I personally agree with you up to a point, in that Westminster has been demonised in Scotland for many years, ebbing and flowing when the Conservatives are in power ( flowing ! ).. but it can't be laid squarely at the SNP's or 'Scottish nationalists' door as you're trying to infer. Certainly not for voters that are around the same age as myself who remember leading and household name Scottish Labour MP's doing exactly the same for many, many years. Constantly questioning Westminster's legitimacy in Scotland. I think those Labour voters that are left, and a few high rankers are now starting to do the same again incidentally.

Shakethedisease

TrickyTree83 wrote: »

Evidence, evidence, evidence, evidence.

Without that it's just talk and feelings.

As Hamish has said, it's all been debunked, and the values are false.

To all the Scottish pro-indy supporters on here - can you actually see now how deluded some of the pro-indy people are? Clearly the majority on here are more well informed which is perhaps why we don't get into the pro-indy economics. But posters such as this reflect a large part of what is seen on WoS blog and twitter feed and related facebook posts.

As I said before, a mis-informed Scottish indy voter is a bad indy voter. Worrying stuff.

We've been through all this before a million times before Tricky.

GERS is the best we have to go on. But it's flawed, has been extremely flawed in the past and even the very point of it being there in the first place has been questioned ( Ian Lang, GERS look it up if you can be bothered ). So it just keeps getting questioned and nit picked over every single time the subject comes up or the latest one is released. It's not a trusted means of accurate accounting anymore. Is it accurate... ?... is it trusted to be accurate. No. Because if it was, Kevin Hague wouldn't need to be blogging about it would he ?

I've said all I personally have to say on it as far as things go. But I guess in terms of any 100% definitive answers as to Scotland's state of play, for many they're not to be found in GERS. There's too many question marks. Indeed, even going forward if there's a Yes vote still more huge questions over what Scotland would take/leave/go halfers on from the union after negotiations. Like yourself, jumping feet first into the unknown if it means political control seems an attractive prospect to many also despite the unknowns of it all.

TrickyTree83

Shakethedisease wrote: »

We've been through all this before a million times before Tricky.

GERS is the best we have to go on. But it's flawed, has been extremely flawed in the past and even the very point of it being there in the first place has been questioned ( Ian Lang, GERS look it up if you can be bothered ). So it just keeps getting questioned and nit picked over every single time the subject comes up or the latest one is released. It's not a trusted means of accurate accounting anymore. Is it accurate... ?... is it trusted to be accurate. No. Because if it was, Kevin Hague wouldn't need to be blogging about it would he ?

I've said all I personally have to say on it as far as things go. But I guess in terms of any 100% definitive answers as to Scotland's state of play, for many they're not to be found in GERS. There's too many question marks. Indeed, even going forward if there's a Yes vote still more huge questions over what Scotland would take/leave/go halfers on from the union after negotiations. Like yourself, jumping feet first into the unknown if it means political control seems an attractive prospect to many also despite the unknowns of it all.

Like I said before too.

Accuracy is not incorrect.

It doesn't need to be 100% accurate to indicate issues, it could be less than 100% accurate, assuming what is said by indy supporters being true, and yet there are still gaping holes in the books of the Scottish economy with the SNP at the wheel no less.

Thrugelmir

Scotlands economy dropped less that £300m after the drop in oil price

The restructuring of the oil and gas industry hasn't finished yet. When a lever gets pulled takes times for the consequences to filter through. On going issues at Wood Group suggest that there's a fine line being walked.

Leanne1812

Tricky, here's the video that I spoke of a couple of posts ago. I know the figures are outdated but it makes an interesting watch if you have half an hour.

( I hope it's the correct video, my iPad is playing up with copying)

Once I post I'll check.

https://youtu.be/1W8cKHcZn60