Civic Nationalism? Aye, Right.

     My skepticism of the above concept is based on nationalism – so often – being grounded in opposition to what nationalists see as an unwelcome, unwanted, and alien force, whether it be external or internal, and this is referred to as “blood and soil nationalism.”

     With regard to Scotland, the SNP has done much to promote itself and the separatist movement as being “civic nationalism” – supposedly expressing itself not so much as being against the United Kingdom, but for the idea that Scotland can better manage its own affairs and deliver social justice as an independent country. Furthermore, this nationalism supposedly promotes the ethos of the late SNP MSP Bashir Ahmad, who said in 1995: “it isn't important where you come from, what matters is where we are going together as a nation.”

     However, as has been seen throughout the referendum campaign and since, the SNP’s style of nationalism at the very least has undeniable blood-and-soil elements. Some of it comes from the top – as when former leader and first minster Alex Salmond implied that Scotland is in “subordination” to England – and some tends to bubble to the surface from the rank-and-file, especially the so-called "cybernats" on social media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.

     This seemed to be the case on Thursday night during the BBC’s popular discussion and current affairs program, Question Time. Hosted by the venerable David Dimbleby and featuring a panel of politicians and commentators before a studio audience which puts questions to them, the program travels across the United Kingdom to be taped in different cities every week, and for last Thursday, it was set in Dundee.

     The panel featured a representative from each party represented in the Scottish Parliament – Deputy First Minister John Swinney of the SNP, Scottish Conservative leader Ruth Davidson, Labour MSP Jenny Mara, Scottish Liberal Democrat leader Willie Rennie, and Scottish Green Party co-leader Patrick Harvie – as well as columnist and commentator Tim Stanley of the Daily Telegraph.

     Now as a foreigner living outside the UK, I did not see and have not yet seen Thursday night’s program as of the time of this writing (YouTube, anyone?), but from observations on Facebook and Twitter, it appeared that the SNP had a challenging time as John Swinney faced questions from audience members regarding Scotland’s financial position following the release of the latest GERS figures (my views on it here). Panelists also rounded on Swinney and the SNP for making a case for separation and breaking up the United Kingdom based on rosy scenarios which have failed to pan out as Scotland approaches what would have been its formal independence day per SNP plans.

     The fact that three of the four other politicians on the panel (Harvie being the exception) were pro-Union was enough to cause consternation among some Nats on social media, but it was the make-up of the audience which produced a substantial fuss.

     Dundee was the city which produced highest “Yes” (to independence) result among Scotland’s 32 council areas at 57% during the referendum, the city council is SNP-controlled, and it is represented by SNP MP’s and MSP’s. Given that, one would think that the audience make-up would have been pro-Nationalist, but the audience apparently reserved much of its criticism and jeers for the SNP. Not only that, but it appeared that there were many people supporting “Brexit” (which is opposed - on the surface, at least - by the SNP) in the audience.

     However, the biggest gripe appeared to be the accents of the people in the audience, and on Facebook and Twitter, many SNP supporters and sympathizers questioned whether the audience members were actually from Dundee, or even Scotland at all. Some even went so far as to accuse the BBC of busing in English people to Dundee to give the appearance of anti-SNP discontent in the “Yes City”.

     Indeed, looking at some of the comments, one would perhaps come away with the idea that Dundee is an area free of anti-SNP sentiment or that Scots are 100% pro-EU and generally think in lock-step, or even that people outside of Dundee and/or Scotland are not welcome – especially those from England or with English accents.

     SNP MP for Perth and North Perthshire Pete Wishart appeared genuinely taken aback at the prospect that the Question Time audience did not conform to his worldview of how Scots and/or Dundonians should think in this tweet where he said: “Hi #bbcqt are you sure you're in Dundee? You've managed to find an incredible number of Tories and Brexiteers for your audience.”

     Meanwhile Kevin Stewart, SNP MSP for Aberdeen Central queried about the supposed lack of local residents in his own tweet: “Can we please hear some Dundonian voices before the end of this #bbcqt?”

     This edition of Question Time created enough “controversy”, that the BBC ended up having to defend it in a statement which in part said that all of the audience members “was a Scottish resident and from Dundee or the surrounding area” and were “chosen because they hold a spectrum of views on a number of topics, including the EU referendum and Scottish independence.” They even went so far as to add that one audience member was an Englishman who had moved to Dundee because he supported separation.

     However, the fact that the Beeb felt it had to release a statement with those words in the first place is a sad indictment on the state of Scotland and Scottish politics in the wake of the referendum. It is a sign of an increasing inwardness and parochialism, and where paranoia and grievance appear to be the order of the day for a substantial part of the population. As much as it is simply ludicrous, for example, to believe that the BBC (or MI5 or whoever) bused or parachuted people into Dundee for Question Time (or even that the program was taped outside of Dundee altogether), the reality is that there are many people who either believe this or are willing to believe it.

     They cannot believe that it is possible that there are some – perhaps many – Dundonians who do not worship at the altar of the SNP and have alternative points of view from the SNP, that some audience members perhaps came from the surrounding areas of Fife and Angus – where there are relatively substantial numbers of Liberal Democrats and Tories, respectively – and that in Dundee itself, there are still Labour stalwarts. Above all, 57% is not 100%, and so 43% of the city voted No. Perhaps they need to visit Dundee themselves and get a feel for the political pulse of the city and its surrounding area's. But then, what are we to make of them apparently not being able to fathom that (GASP!) English-accented voices may be present in a city within the United Kingdom? Just imagine the reaction if this had been the other way around.

     This is blood and soil nationalism, pure and simple, and the contempt for “outsiders” was barely concealed. If the Nationalist's actually believed in what they preached with civic nationalism, there should have been no complaints about English accents on Question Time in Dundee any more than complaints about Scottish accents on Question Time in Liverpool.

     As a British citizen or legal resident within the United Kingdom, it indeed should not matter where you come from.

Nats, Maps, and (Misguidedly) Feeling Small

     One of the more humorous aspects of the referendum was the complaint from some Nationalists at how Scotland appeared on the BBC’s weather maps. At first, I had thought of it was something of an in-house joke among such Nationalists, but quickly realized that they actually believed that the BBC was deliberately – and with malicious intent – making Scotland appear small in relation to rest of the United Kingdom, especially England.

     It was, they claimed, proof positive of a BBC bias against Scotland – a way of “keeping Scotland down” and “putting it in its place.” It confirmed that there was a systematic view of Scotland being insignificant within the UK, and as the campaign ground on, this view became entrenched in the minds of many people who saw the BBC as the enemy of Scotland and the pro-independence campaign.

     In today’s post-referendum environment, the weather maps continue to provide a source for manufactured nationalist grievance against the supposed injustices against Scotland by the BBC.

     Over the weekend however, this went to a whole new level as SNP members of Parliament got in on the act and used their position as public servants (and their substantial following on Twitter) to “raise awareness” and take shots at the BBC as well as people who support keeping the UK together.

     First, there was the recently-elected MP for Caithness, Sutherland and Easter Ross, Dr. Paul Monaghan. On Friday, he tweeted out a GIF image showing the BBC’s weather map of the UK and Ireland as it appears during a broadcast, then drawing a red outline featuring an alternative view of the UK to show how the bottom part of the country (lower England and Wales) on the weather map appears to be normal, but Scotland appear smaller by comparison. The message in the tweet was: “How the #BBC works to make Scotland literally appear less significant: ‘The BBC Versus Reality’.”

     Then there was Ronnie Cowan, MP for Inverclyde, who said that “a weather map should be to scale and the BBC image is certainly not in a scale I recognize”, and Angus MacNeil of the Western Isles chimed in to say that his first political act at Westminster was an Early Day Motion (EDM) to complain about weather maps.

     Of course, a streak of SNP whining over the weather maps could not be complete without the wisdom Pete Wishart, the veteran Nationalist MP for Perth and North Perthshire. On his Twitter account, he accused pro-Union Scots (whom he refers to as “yoons”) of being “never happier than when Scotland is diminished and shown to be small and distant.”

     Looked upon separately, these musings would appear to be isolated and occasional rantings and ravings from eccentric individuals among the rank-and-file of the party. However, these are elected MP’s and leaders in their party, and in Wishart’s case, the SNP’s Shadow Leader of the House of Commons.

     As has been seen however, the senior members of the SNP are not immune from making ludicrous statements about the BBC, or anything they wish to see as insults against Scotland. Former leader and first minister Alex Salmond has repeatedly attacked the national broadcaster during and since the referendum campaign for its coverage, and recently condemned it for being “a national disgrace” and “guilty of sustained bias against the national cause.” (Note how he says “national cause” as though separation is the cause of all of Scotland - and it is not - as opposed to the “nationalist cause” which is the cause of the SNP.)

     This attitude toward the BBC from the upper echelons of the SNP have the effect of feeding into the general paranoia which already exists, and therefore legitimizes and encourages it, which in turn causes more people to believe the nonsense of invented slights such as the weather maps as part of a vast conspiracy by the Beeb to treat Scotland as a non-entity, or with less respect than it deserves. The result, among other things, was the ugly protests outside of the Corporation’s headquarters in Scotland during the referendum.

     In reality, the weather map issue is much less dramatic and exotic, but by no means boring – at least for those of us interested in geography and mapping methods. The BBC uses weather maps based on geostationary satellite images which are taken from a location approximately 22,300 miles over the equator, which means that the areas closest to the equator will always appear bigger in the picture than the areas further away from it because of the angle produced by virtue of the satellite being over the equator and the curvature of the Earth. Examples of them can be seen at the website of the Dundee Satellite Receiving Station of the University of Dundee, as well as this live map at Tonbridge-Weather.org.uk.

     Weather maps produced from these satellites are quite common and popular with news broadcasters because they require little or no reorientation, and I have seen them featured in several times for weather new and forecasts, including the ones the BBC produces when they report on the weather in the US and Canada . As the camera moves around the map from north to south, the northern parts of Canada and the US (including individual states and provinces) appear smaller while the southern parts appear large by comparison. This is very similar to the way the Beeb presents the weather in the UK, with the camera moving from north to south, and northern areas appearing smaller and southern areas appearing larger. In the case of Scotland-only forecasts, this results in the Highlands and Islands looking smaller compared to the rest of Scotland. As with everything else mentioned, this comes to where the satellite is positioned, and not part of conspiracy or bias on the part of the BBC to make Scotland and Scots feel small, insignificant, and/or inadequate.

     I’d like to believe that some in the SNP – especially those in leadership positions – understand this, but hey-ho, why let facts get in the way of lucrative grievance-mongering?

     Make no mistake, the only people who see Scotland as small and insignificant are the Scottish nationalists, because they are the ones who have an unhealthy inferiority complex about Scotland and themselves being part of the United Kingdom. Day in and day out, they bang on about how wee and powerless Scotland is within the Union – portraying Scotland as some sort of abused victim that has been relentless beaten and flogged senselessly. They look for anything which might be seen or can be construed as a slight against Scotland, and the weather maps are part of this in an effort to stoke more division and resentment in their obsession to break up Britain.

     What they fail to realize is that the decision to use certain weather maps has nothing to do with Scotland, and that most people across the UK (including Scotland) actually tune in to see what the weather is going to be like and then promptly move on their lives – as opposed to getting obsessed about how any one part of the UK looks in relation to another.

     To make this point more clear, I don’t believe the BBC has a pro-Cornish bias simply because Cornwall appears as the biggest part of the UK on the weather map; Cornwall just happens to be the southern-most area of the UK and is therefore closest to the geostationary satellite from which the maps are based. Furthermore, the southern part of the Republic of Ireland (not in the UK) appears larger than Northern Ireland (in the UK) for much the same reason – geographic happenstance.

     Perhaps the Beeb should change its maps to flat projections which ignore the curvature of the Earth. It really does not matter so long as the weather is properly forecasted and reported, but if it shuts up the more whiny Nationalists out there, then I’m all for it.

     However, while they whine about how small Scotland is, we need to talk about how significant Scotland is as a part of the UK – how it and its people have contributed immensely to the country economically, politically, and socially and culturally, as well as to its sense of self and purpose over the centuries.

     Now that’s a positive and encouraging story worth telling about (as opposed to whipping up corrosive, negative, and manufactured grievances), with the hope that it may guide future generations of Scots – proudly alongside their fellow Britons in the rest of the UK – to continue making invaluable contributions for a long time to come.

     As for the more eccentric Nats (including the aforementioned MP's), they can keep on feeling small and inadequate if they want while everyone else moves forward.

Inwardness of Nationalism

     As some of you may know, the BBC's James Cook was transferred to the United States to become the Corporation's West Coast correspondent based in Los Angeles, California.

     Previously, Cook was the Beeb's Scotland correspondent, during which time he covered the referendum last year, and he - like many other journalists - was met with accusations of bias throughout the campaign. He received abuse from both sides of the debate, but especially from the notorious cybernats who questioned his journalistic integrity and accused him of being a puppet for the Union/Westminster/the Tories/Red Tories, etc.

     This continued during general election earlier this year, but Cook moved to the West Coast of America afterward to cover news for this area of the country.

     So this week, Cook was doing his job covering the tragic mass shooting in San Bernadino which has claimed the lives of 14 people and injured 21 others. Last night, he tweeted out a message about the loss of life with a link to the San Bernardino County coroner's list of the names of the deceased. What followed was this exchange between him and a man named (at least on Twitter) "Angra Mainyu".

     This is one of the worst aspects of nationalism and of what it can do to people. It makes them more parochial, inward-looking, and less conscious/aware of what goes on in the world around them in general and outside their country in particular. Everything becomes about the country without regard to anythings else (and I admit, many of my fellow Americans are sadly guilty of this as well), but of course we ought to be interested in what happens in other places because it may affect us. In the case of James Cook, it is as though Mainyu has contempt for the idea of a Scottish journalist covering a significant story half-way around the world with his question regarding how it had anything to do with "us" - presumably meaning Scots.

     When Cook responds with his reasoning for being there and doing his job (and the nature of it), he is accused of being a "errand boy" who has no say in what he covers or how he covers it - as if to say that Cook is taking his orders from London or otherwise failing to cover news events relevant to Scotland - or at least, presenting the story via a Scottish dimension.

     Perhaps Mainyu did not know about Cook's transfer out of Scotland, but even when Cook made that point clear, the troll made it known that he was "not impressed" with this as "one of the dwindling number" of people paying the license fee which funds the BBC (and therefore pays Cook's salary).  It was at this point that Cook left the man alone and moved on - presumably knowing that this exchange was going nowhere, and that he had more important things to do to, such as fulfilling his duties as a BBC journalist and responding to more relevant social media messages.

     Nevertheless in my opinion, this not only shows how this sort of activity has followed Cook, but also shows how nationalism has affected people by warping their minds in ways that are unhealthy and disappointing. Yes, this was only one person, but it is not hard to find his attitudes replicated in other settings and situations, especially in the world of social media.

     We saw a bit of this in the open with the SNP attempting to use the UK's military intervention against Daesh in Syria to foment division within the UK, claim Scotland is getting "dragged" into it against its will, and fuel their separatist obsessions. Indeed, by having all of their Commons MP's vote against the airstrikes and complaining about the use of Scottish-based RAF fighter jets in Syria, the SNP seemed more interested in making the crisis in that troubled area about Scotland and its place in the Union, rather than about answering the call for help from an old ally and friend victimized by Daesh (France) and the unanimous declaration of the UN Security Council for member states to use "all necessary measures" against the barbaric terrorist group.

     It is probably for this reason (among other things) that Kenny Farquharson of The Times has stated that "the SNP has demonstrated to the world that we Scots cannot be relied upon in an international crisis." The response from cybernats on Twitter was predictable: personal insults against him and his "anti-Scottish propaganda" newspaper - claiming that its Scottish readership is down when its actually up - and accusations of shilling for the establishment.

     Farquharson is likely used to these kinds of messages coming in his direction, as is James Cook, which is probably why he quickly extricated himself from the exchange with the time-waster Angra Mainyu, but it is nevertheless unfortunate that he goes through this in the course of his job. The callousness of this particular individual was so extraordinary that Cook had to explain that he was covering "humanity", something which knows no boundaries, and now there is a strong possibility that this shooting was an act of terrorism inspired by overseas elements.

     If that is not worth covering - wherever it may be - then I don't know what it is. However, I know that I do not wish to inhabit that tiny and narrow world occupied by Angra Mainyu and his ilk.