Fuck Scottishness. I'm Voting Yes.

To paraphrase Allen Chun who said the same of China, something called "Scotland" unquestionably exists, but, more importantly there is a multitude of expressions to denote different aspects of Scotland and Scottish-ness. There is no room for these multiple perspectives in our official political debates right now as Scotland continues to be represented through flags, whiskey, and mountains by British and Scottish nationalists. Impartiality is impossible so let me explain how my biases and personal experiences shape my politics and my choice to vote yes to Scottish independence. I was born in Scotland and I have lived for several years in England and in China. My father was born in London but left the UK's supposedly cosmopolitan capital because it was "too parochial" and because north of Watford is not barbarian country. His father was from Waterford in southern Ireland and came to London to escape his own involvement in a civil war which pitted brother against brother in a battle for control of the nation against the British empire. He was then told "no dogs, no Irish" on arrival, so he had to start his own small business. He married a woman from England who I was lucky to grow up with and who I can't recall even mentioning countries.

My mother was born in Clydebank outside Glasgow into a family of migrants from Donegal. They arrived in Scotland with Irish as their first language and we spent every summer in the hills of Donegal. My grandmother was an Irish catholic and she read the Bible. My grandfather was an internationalist socialist and read the communist manifesto. The first time I ever wore a Scottish football top as a 7 year old, I was called a "mongrel" with "no right to wear that" by my protestant neighbour. I attended a "non-denominational" school which sent us to the Church of Scotland for every Christian festival! Almost every day of primary school I was called a "fenian bastard" and almost every day I responded in kind to call them "orange bastards" in return. I grew up being teased by my dad for being a "fenian" for supporting Celtic and had to suffer in silence listening to friend's dads calling people "English bastards". Even as children we discussed our identity at school. It's impossible not to given our history. I was always told I'm British because my passport says so yet this inclusion made me feel more excluded than ever as it offered no concern for how I understood myself, the daily reality of mutual exclusion, or my family history. The idea that my identity or anyone's identity could simplify and gloss over these contestations and simply return to being British or being Scottish feels foreign to me.

Ethnic majorities have a responsibility to understand minority and in-between experiences. They tend to forget they have their own identity attachments because they are surrounded by people with seemingly similar ones. Telling someone to be above nationalism when they have been marked their whole lives as different and foreign is not progressive, it's an unconsciously ethno-centric view of the world which seeks to detach themselves from all responsibility from the complex realities of colonialism, marginalisation, and discrimination. To witness the scandal that is the official debate on the subject which frames Yes voters as nationalists and then fails to deconstruct any of the ideological assumptions of why people vote no or feel British, feels like everything I've just written and the colour and fuzziness of the identity politics I know I have lived through is meaningless. The political debate makes a politics lecturer want to withdraw from politics. To have to justify why I am not a nationalist to people who have thought about these things for a few hours when I have been forced to think about these things every day since I was a boy is tiresome and worrying. You are no or you are yes, you don't like the SNP or you do, you are with us or you are against us. The party political machines have the real victory here not because people want to vote no but because it is impossible to have a debate without relying on these childish binaries, which most children know are imagined. Their victory is society's loss because instead of sharing my hopes and fears with many English friends I'm forced to justify why I'm not anti-English instead of discussing how to make things better. Instead of being excited by politics, I feel like it is nothing to do with me.

The political parties have long converged on a neoliberal consensus: the Conservatives are cowboy capitalists, Labour is whatever the Conservatives say with a smile and a tax rebate for working families, and the Lib Dems are part of an illiberal coalition presiding over declining civil liberties and freedom of speech. There is no debate. They are willing the "end of history" to insist we all agree on values, we just differ on detail. The discourse of "austerity" overshadows every possible political discussion. The rapid growth of food banks since 2008 and the media and politician's unwillingness to fully tackle the issue should be the scandal of our age. The value of humans and their right to be seen as good British citizens is judged solely by their contribution to GDP as the most vulnerable in our society are called scum and gazed upon in human zoos such as Benefits Street. There is no hope of any alternative being offered outside this discourse and it is a guarantee of further economic inequality and political disengagement. I'll be voting yes not because it guarantees social justice but because it is the only offer on the table of doing anything whatsoever about it.

The referendum does not ask us how we identify ourselves or how do we understand our history. It asks "do you think Scotland should be an independent nation?". I wanted to say no so I could reject the need for nations altogether but the best way to do that is to say Yes. A no vote simply confirms we are happy to move to the next general election with excluding everyone who isn't British and or economically viable the dominant motif. Leaving the EU and the "threat" of immigrants are now top of the very unconsciously nationalist political agenda which dominates the UK's political discourse. I'll be voting yes because I have never been British and I would like to have a meaningful debate about how colonialism, including the participation of Scots, shapes how we view ourselves and the outside world. The smaller the state the easier it will be to ask how are people being marginalised and stigmatised in Easterhouse, Calton, and East Kilbride, places I've yet to hear being mentioned by our "leaders" crippling the debate. I want to be able to look beyond Scotland V England and look at how we marginalise people on our own doorstep. I want to say Fuck Scottish-ness  and it mean something. 

Commodified Communities: Selling the Nation in a Global Age

Patriotism and consumerism appear to have no obvious connection. The nation as a bounded community of people who identify with one another appears to stand in contrast to the workings of global capital which flows across borders in the search for profit not social recognition. Production and trade have been transnationalised to the extent that ‘Buy American’ and ‘Buy British’ is impossible when buying any consumer goods made of more than a few simple parts. A single computer may be designed in Silicon Valley, built in Japan, assembled in South East Asia, and dumped in China when past their sell by date. However, we still see a growing clamour to sell national pride and to commercialise the boundaries of belonging. Since 9/11 Wal-Mart expanded its sale of flag-emblazoned merchandise for sale with “respectful” and “patriotic” flag disposal services in stores for used flags positioned conveniently next to shiny new ones. In 2004, Wal-Mart was voted the most admired company in the US despite facing criticism for its unfair wages for women, de-unionisation, and monopoly practices. Professor Jennifer Scanlon says “the American Public and Wal-Mart are complicit in a performance of patriotism in which consumerism stands in for more concrete and difficult civic work”. It is easier to buy belonging in a community than to work to make it a better place. This is a reciprocal relationship between consumerism and nationalism such that transnational companies sell the nation and the nation buys it. This dynamic where consumerism and nationalism reproduce and reinforce each other is not restricted to the US. In China, Aigo is one of the nation’s leading electronic companies and is now a sponsor of Manchester United FC. The name Aigo in Mandarin Chinese (aiguozhe; 爱国者) means “patriot” and this is not lost on Chinese consumers seeking to “buy Chinese” in an age where their consumer options are transnationalised. One of the most frequent seen adverts on Chinese state television (CCTV) between 2009-2010 was for a medicine brand which ended with the catchphrase “mother I love you, motherland I love you” (mama wo ai ni, zuguo wo ai ni; 妈妈我爱你, 祖国我爱你). Viewers are then left with the impression that loyalty to a consumer brand equates to loyalty to the nation. You can buy belonging in a national-consumer community.

How people choose to spend their money has long been represented by states as linked to their identity as members of the nation. One of the many propaganda cartoons produced by Walt Disney in the first half of the twentieth century represented American consumers as divided between spending and saving. Scrooge McDuck tells Americans they must “save for victory” in World War 2. Spending money was un-patriotic because it helps the rise of Fascism by draining the treasury of tax resources. Of course representations of the nation have changed as capitalism becomes more and more globalised and it shifts from supply-side economics to demand-led. One of the first public addresses by President George Bush after 9/11 was to stress the threat of terrorism to our ever-expanding consumerist lifestyle linking shopping with national security: “We cannot let the terrorists achieve the objective of frightening our citizens to the point where we don’t…conduct business, we don’t shop”. “We” are being defined as shoppers and the threat of terrorism is to our “we-ness” is through the danger presented to our consumer-lifestyles. More recently, David Cameron defined Britishness through our economic behaviour during the “financial crisis”: “Some say that to succeed in this world, we need to become more like India or China, or Brazil, but I say: we need to become more like us. The real us. Hard-working, pioneering, independent, creative, adaptable, optimistic, can-do”. In practical terms Cameron continued to stress we pay off our credit card bills, tying national loyalty to stabilising financial capitalism. It seems patriotism is emerging as a resource our leaders can draw on to demand the economy works in specific ways. “Can-do” or “stiff upper lip” means “flexible” labour protection policy and a “disciplined” labour force in the words of the IMF. Cameron is using patriotism to tell people in Britain that they are not like Indians or Chinese, we are different. We should supposedly keep it that way by paying off our credit card bills and working hard and without question in a labour market that has seen employment slump and benefits slashed since the Conservative Party came to power. To be British means to behave in ways which maintain the workings of capitalism as it currently works- don’t’ complain about anything or you aren’t “can-do” and you aren’t British. For Cameron, it also means we should identify with billionaires within our borders who benefit from inequality instead of Indians and Chinese who suffer from it.

The recent public debates over the wearing of the poppy for Remembrance Sunday are a case in point. Turnouts at the cenotaph for actual remembrance are relatively small and co-ordinated through active organisations such as the British Legion. However, more passive consumers can now purchase all manner of goods from ties to caps to umbrellas to cufflinks to tablecloths in order to display their level of patriotic devotion and stand “shoulder to shoulder with all those who serve”. Judging by the Poppy Shop’s apology on their website in November 2011 that orders would be delayed due to a high volume of orders, it appears the British public are keen to buy their community membership. However, they are less keen to do “concrete and difficult civic work”. Joining a campaign, for example, to give an hour of one’s time to look after elderly veterans who are now in Britain’s understaffed nursing homes would be of more benefit than wearing a poppy. Wearing of the poppy to symbolise national belonging, which involves nothing but a small purchase, has in recent years been mobilised to the extent that it is framed as an issue of national security. The BBC linked tragic deaths of soldiers in Afghanistan, a very real and violent conflict, to the banality of the poppy. On Question Time, the popular British politics ‘debate’ show, Stephen Pollard, journalist and author on Israeli politics and history, claimed burning poppies should be outlawed, regardless of freedom of speech because they go to the heart of “who we are”. Identity here is framed as a security issue such that alternatives to this particular understanding of national identity are to be eliminated through force. David Cameron saw fit to demand FIFA, football’s ruling body, make the exception only for England to allow “political and religious” symbols on national football shirts in their game against Spain because it was a matter of “national pride”. Cameron and other Conservatives stressed that the poppy was “not political”. However, it is impossible to claim England’s supposed symbols of “national pride” are “not political” but those of other nations, which are banned on national football shirts, are “political”. This representation of the poppy as a performance of patriotism may not be new. However, what is new is this vigour that defines purchase and display of a poppy as the very heart of “who we are” and a symbol which is unquestionable and beyond politics. The English national football team have played on the 11^th November many times over the years and haven’t worn or asked to wear poppies on their shirts. This is but an example how of national communities become a commodified mode of self-understanding where alternatives are deemed ‘outside’ the boundaries of community. This follows the framings of how we organise capitalism and how we spend our earnings as security issues at the heart of our national identities. There are many ways to interpret why wars happen and whose interests they serve. However, the voices of those who see the First World War as a human tragedy which saw states across the world needlessly send millions of working class humans to their death are being excluded as un-patriotic because they don’t wish to wear the poppy. The poppy is said to represent them but it does not represent their views because it has become a symbol of “national pride” instead of remembering dead human beings. Today, identifying with humans who are victims of wars waged by Britain in Iraq and Afghanistan beyond our borders over those within our nation who send them to war is deemed unpatriotic in the same way that submitting to a flexible, unregulated labour market is essential to being British. Today, capital and people flow across borders but there is still capital to be made by going to war and selling its products under the banner of patriotism.

Imagining Sectarianism, Imagining Scotland

We have frequently heard the political slogan, “One Scotland, many cultures”, since it was launched in 2007 to brand Scotland a pluralistic society characterised by tolerance of difference. However, judging by a Scottish government poll which found that more than 85% of Scots want “sectarianism” to be an illegal offence with 89% declaring it “offensive”, most Scots now freely admit that Scotland has a problem with “sectarianism”. Roseanna Cunningham, Minister for Community Safety and Legal Affairs, told the BBC that sectarianism threatens the “very fabric of Scotland; we want to be tolerant, respectful, and forward looking”. Roseanna Cunningham’s comments and the first draft of the much-debated “anti-sectarianism bill” reveal how the debate on sectarianism is producing ideas about what type of nation Scotland should be and what it means to be Scottish. When we talk about sectarianism and what it means to be Scottish, we are, in the words of Benedict Anderson, imagining the nation. By limiting who is and isn’t to be thought of as authentically Scottish we produce what it means to be Scottish. Sectarianism is seen as a religious problem and to protect the “very fabric” of Scotland we need legislation to stop people calling each other “insert-religion-here bastards” but not necessarily “insert-ethnicity-or-nationality-here bastards”. This creates the danger that we ignore ethnocentrism whereas we crack down on religious bigotry. Here I seek not to evaluate the extent of sectarianism or to “take sides” but to examine how the term is used and the implications for how people understand Scottish identity.

It is a welcome change for complex issues in which history, nationalism, and religion are entangled in complex webs of self-identification to be on the front of our national newspapers instead of relegated to the sports pages. Complacency has previously allowed those discussing bigotry to reinforce national stereotypes and produce ideas about what it means to be Scottish without being challenged. For example, in 2004 the journalist Stuart Cosgrove criticised Aiden McGeady’s choice to play football for the Republic of Ireland, the country of his grandparents’ birth, instead of Scotland where he was born. Cosgrove claimed McGeady’s choice was representative of international football’s descent to the level of a “Woolworths pick and mix”. How a long history of cross-border flows of people between Scotland and Ireland has affected how people identify themselves in complex ways is dismissed as “pick and mix”. In other words, mongrel-like or not “authentic”. Like many other football journalists, Cosgrove was theorising about what constitutes national identity albeit in a comedic fashion. Cosgrove, like many commentators, employed an uncritical definition of nation as the place of one’s birth to criticise how an 18 year old footballer identified himself. His idea of national identity is exclusionary: you are simply with us (people born in Scotland who call themselves Scottish) or against us (people born in Scotland who call themselves Irish). There can be no middle ground. In a liberal democracy, which seeks to reject sectarianism, this self-identification should be an individual’s decision and the individual’s decision alone. The greatest problem here is not that people have this view of national identity. The problem is that such intolerance of those who identify themselves in a different way is left unchallenged because it is seen as belonging to the realm of football and “banter”. Thousands of people tune in to similar debates on radio stations and in print- this is influence without responsibility. Such football journalists are unwittingly imagining the boundaries of the nation through their writing. They define what it means to be Scottish and frequently exclude those who choose to celebrate what they understand to be their Irish heritage.

Dr John Kelly of the University of Edinburgh argues that the public discourse on sectarianism constructs a unified, non-sectarian identity that purportedly “real” and “authentic” Scots should share in opposition to a set of sectarian ‘Others’. In other words, by excluding certain characteristics, this discourse imagines what it means to be Scottish. In 2006 the now retired pundit, Gerry McNee, dismissed the Fields of Athenry and The Boys of the Old Brigade sung by Celtic fans along with the Sash and Derry’s Walls, often sung by Rangers fans, as “Irish tosh” “we need to get rid of”. In other words, “real” and “authentic” Scots have enclosed national identities without the “sectarian” cross-border influence from Ireland. This is of course ironic. The Sash and Derry’s walls are sung by Rangers supporters and proponents of the British Union in Northern Ireland to celebrate Britishness and how they identify themselves as not being part of Ireland. McNee’s comments were reflective of a widespread simplistic view of complex social issues that “sectarianism” comes from some barbaric outside world which we should contrast our civilised selves against.

Dismissing people’s views as “Irish tosh” because they sing songs to commemorate what they see as their British or Irish heritage narrowly draws the boundaries of acceptable public identification such that people feel their identities are under threat. This imagines Scotland as some enclosed, discrete community yet our history tells us the borders between Ireland, Northern Ireland, and Scotland are very fluid and the trans-border flows of migration are a constant. Being Irish or being British does not make one a bigot but refusing to allow people to understand themselves this way does. As Dr John Kelly noted in his written submission to the Justice Committee on the “anti-sectarianism bill”, celebration of one’s identity is not a social problem unless this involves hatred of other identities. People can disagree over the nationalist political sentiments expressed in The Boys of the Old Brigade or Derry’s Walls but it is difficult find anything in the songs themselves which express hatred of other identities. There are intolerable, racist songs sung in Scottish football grounds which is another issue altogether. However, it would be highly illiberal to criminalise songs because they celebrate identities which are not “authentically” Scottish or because we disagree with their political sentiments.

National identities can be multiple, especially in the United Kingdom. As Benedict Anderson asked “to what nation does the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland refer?”. One can be Scottish and Irish at the same time- the two countries are not sealed off and people travel and have inter-married for a very long time. One can also be Scottish and British at the same time. Many will argue it is impossible to be Irish and British but is this difference really a problem? Difference is not a problem but how it is socially organised can be. If we criminalise or marginalise people not because they hate the Other but because they see themselves as Irish or British we will create resentment and create a much more serious national conflict than we currently witness. Politicians and tourist boards can imagine an enclosed, culturally isolated Scotland but our history has different stories which should be told. If we want Scotland to be a nation of many cultures we have to allow its people celebrate their many origins.

There is No Hierarchy of Sectarianisms

Audre Lorde once said “there is no hierarchy of oppressions” and in Scotland we should be cautious not to create one. 2011 has seen the Scottish parliament attempt to draft and hastily pass legislation on what is publicly celebrated in the political soundbite of “anti-sectarianism legislation” ("Offensive Behaviour at Football and Threatening Communications Bill"). The rushed draft illustrates little consideration of what sectarianism means and subsequently employs an imbalanced definition. The stated purpose of the legislation is to criminalise behaviour that expresses “hatred of, or stirring up hatred against, a group of persons based on their membership (or presumed membership) of a religious group, a social or cultural group with a perceived religious affiliation”. There are provisions for applying this to hatred against groups other than religious ones but these are sub-sectional clauses. They do not apply to section 5, a crucial part of the bill, which covers all recorded forms of speech. The emphasis is on discrimination or “stirring hatred” against groups defined by religion. The Scottish council of Jewish Communities astutely raised the problem that this “risks creating a hierarchy of discrimination”. This would mean that we only discuss “sectarianism” and prejudice in terms of religion thus ignoring ethnocentrism and racism.

No public debate over the meaning of sectarianism has taken place despite widespread calls for one, including from the Harps Community Project, an Irish cultural association, and the Rangers Supporters’ Assembly. There is no agreed academic definition of sectarianism but its use presumes and perhaps normatively demands a higher, enclosed form of national identification. One definition of sectarianism, which circulates widely in the media and on internet forums comes from Wikipedia: "bigotry, discrimination, or hatred arising from attaching importance to perceived differences between subdivisions within a group, such as between different denominations of a religion or factions of a political movement". This presumes the existence of a unified group in the first place; some common identity which is being split between internal sects. However, the issue at hand is tension over group identification itself: people identifying with two different group categories (Irish and British) and competing for recognition and sometimes dominance. Nil By Mouth the leading Scottish charity, which challenges sectarianism, defines sectarianism as “Narrow-minded beliefs that lead to prejudice, discrimination, malice and ill-will towards members, or presumed members, of a religious denomination”. This defines and stigmatises sectarianism as purely a religious issue. This is not an academic exercise- how we define the word could determine who is to be imprisoned for up to 5 years under the new legislation. Without an informed and public debate people will continue to conflate and confuse nationality and religion. The comments of Police Federation Chairman, Les Gray, typified this confusion when he is quoted as conflating a 17^th century King of Scotland, England, and Ireland with a contemporary religious leader: "I've been in homes with King Billy on the wall and on the other side with the Pope on the wall, and both sides are just as bad.".

This is not to say that “sectarianism” has nothing to do with religion. However, it is unconvincing to frame the violence on the streets of Scotland after Celtic and Rangers play football and amongst men who do not attend church through the prism of the “Great Schism of Western Christianity” (1378-1416) or the Reformation beginning in the 16^th century. Some Celtic fans do choose to sing ‘Roamin in the Gloamin’ (“Fuck King Billy and John Knox”) and some Rangers fans choose to sing ‘No Pope of Rome’ (“No chapels to sadden my eyes”). These songs clearly emphasise religious identification and some would argue hatred of a religious Other. However, it is difficult rely on religion to explain why many more Celtic fans choose to sing The Soldier’s Song, the Irish national anthem, and Rangers fans, Rule Britannia. It seems misleading to discuss “sectarianism” or so-called “sectarian identities” without reference to nationalism and national identities.

In public political debates, there has been too little mention of the competing views on what nation(s) we belong to when we see Scottish, Irish, Northern Irish, and British flags being waved at our football grounds, some of which rightly or wrongly spark antagonism. It is this antagonism which is often at the heart of tensions we tend to describe as “sectarian”. One song sung by Rangers fans and cited as racist and sectarian by Celtic fans is The Famine Song (“the famine is over, why don’t you go home?”). This song does not refer to religion. The song is about telling descendents of Irish immigrants they are no longer welcome in the nation of Scotland and that they should return to their “home” nation. Many Rangers fans and Strathclyde Police assert that The Boys of the Old Brigade is equally “sectarian” (“On Easter morn’ I sigh, for I recall my comrades all, and dark old days gone by”). The song laments the loss of life during the Easter Rising, in which Catholics and Protestants participated. The reference to joining the IRA in the song is what is cited on the blogs of Rangers supporters as “sectarian” and crucially “anti-British”. Framing how people think about Irish history today solely through the prism of religion is problematic when people today know Protestants and Catholics alike participated in the Easter Rising. This religious prism fails to help us understand that at heart what is being criticised as sectarian in The Boys of the Old Brigade is about national boundaries not simply religious ones: “anti-British” not anti-Protestant.

The main concern raised in the Rangers Supporters Assembly’s contribution to the Scottish Parliament’s justice committee was that of the singing of “non-patriotic songs”. This presumably refers to songs which are patriotic towards Ireland over Britain such as The Boys of the Old Brigade. The Rangers Supporters Assembly claim this should be included as a prosecutable offence under the new legislation, illustrating the tensions over national identification being played out here. Online debates amongst Rangers fans and indeed former Rangers director Donald Findlay QC have sought to redefine the term “Fenian” from common usage on Scotland’s streets as a general slur with anti-Catholic connotations against Celtic fans to now mean Irish nationalists. “Fenian bastard” is then argued to be a permissible phrase because it insults and excludes people on the basis of their national and political identification. However, it seems unreasonable to argue that it is unacceptable to stir hatred against religious groups but it is acceptable to stir hatred against groups defined by national identification.

The Harps Community Project said “preconceptions surrounding cultural expression and identity with reference to Scotland’s Irish community must be discussed out-with this enforced sectarian narrative of Catholic versus Protestant”. In other words, national heritage should not be understood within an unconsciously bigoted framing of Scottish to mean Protestant and Irish as Catholic. Singing the Boys of the Old Brigade or Derry’s Walls may reveal something about someone’s national identity or their politics but it does not directly express religious hatred and it tells us nothing about someone’s religion. Hatred of the Other should not be tolerated but by defining “sectarianism” in purely religious terms we ignore the competing national identities, which are often at the heart of these communal tensions. Rogers Brubaker, an eminent expert on Nationalism, tells us national conflicts are not resolved- politicians can’t suddenly change how people identify themselves. What they can do is help create an environment in which conflict is less necessary and those identities have less political relevance. Allowing people to celebrate how they identify themselves without fear of persecution, providing they are not celebrating hatred against other groups, would help create such an environment. Creating a hierarchy of sectarianisms where we can abuse people on the grounds of national identification but not on religion may do the opposite.