English Scots for YES

I think I belong in the United Kingdom and that is where I want to stay. I would hazard a guess that most Scots, who happen to live in another part of the UK, and so were never consulted, feel the same.

The ones I absolutely cannot comprehend are people like the fake reverend who lives in Bath and is one of the most prolific and vicious of the cybernats. Why does he not live in Scotland if he hates the part of the country he lives in so much that he works non stop to destroy the UK?

God knows varian, who knows how these horrible peoples minds work. As you say, why live here if you hate it so much!

Don't reverends live where they are sent?

Yes, granny23 I feel my home town is Edinburgh.
I came to Scotland (unwillingly) with my parents in my teens. At school I was surrounded by Scots, it was total immersion. I made good friends and I was never ever got at for being English (my little brother at primary school, however, a quiet studious boy, was repeatedly targeted by a particularly vicious little thug, but that lad was only half-Scottish, his father was a German who had settled here after the war and his mother was said to be violent at home and foulmouthed in public)

My own opinion is that it would be better for Scotland to remain as part of the United Kingdom, and that is how I voted in the referendum. There has been so much crossing of the border, in one direction or the other, so much intermarriage, so many children with mixed genes from all over the British Isles and beyond, that it is impossible to divide Scots from any other heritage. We speak the same language, more or less. The nearest natural markets for Scottish produce and manufacturing are England and Wales, just as the Scots are part of the home market for goods from south of the border, and having a barrier to instant trading doesn't make sense. No more does having to show a passport at Berwick or at a bleak layby up in the border hills.

I don't know anything about that fake reverend in Bath, varian. Does he claim to be a CoE reverend or an Episcopalian reverend, or another denomination, or is he freelance and just shouting his mouth off?

I don't think all clergy get sent to charges by their superiors, dj. In the Church of Scotland a vacancy is filled by a vacancy board representative of the congregation, by interviews and an invitation to conduct a "test" service and sermon after which the congregation expresses their views and a call is sent to the applicant (or not). Of course, a fake clergyman could live anywhere he wished.

I agree Elegran,
I am the reverse of you .
However I feel a Scot And love my homeland,
But my life and family are now south of the border.
I don't know if other expats (Scots) feel that they are continually having to explain or stand up for Scotland.
I understand both sides of the devolution argument but it saddens that I am often seem to be playing devils advocate.
The press on both sides of the border appear to take great pleasure in stirring up bad feeling between England and Scotland

The fake reverend who lives in Bath apparently bought his title of reverend from some fake American church online. He doesn't have a church, or conduct services or preach sermons except for his continuing sermon that Scotland must separate from the rest of the UK.

He is a very notorious cybernat troll. I know his name but do not wish to repeat it. If you should want to discover him and his well funded website, I'm sure you could do so. I don't know whether or not he has been disowned by the SNP, but he certainly should have been if they want to retain any credibility.

I found him, varian The Church of Scotland told the Mail it had no record of him as a Kirk minister.

According to the Mail - "Yes Scotland chief executive Blair Jenkins has previously replied to him on Twitter and accepted an invitation from him to take part in a public debate, though the Yes camp has since distanced itself from him. . . . a Yes Scotland spokesman said: ‘He is not part of Yes Scotland and we do not have any direct contact with him.' "

His website raised just over £33,000 to pay himself a wage and he plans to run a second major funding appeal to secure that salary and to pay for further projects.

Straying from the topic of independence, he once sparred with the sister of Hillsborough victim Thomas Fox, telling her: ‘If people stop when they get to a wall of human beings instead of ramming it, nobody dies.’ He accused those he holds responsible for the crushing of being ‘c***s’.

A band-wagon jumper and self-publicist. Not the kind of publicity that any campaign is looking for!

Yes, with people like him as a friend, who needs enemies?

I've just been reading a very interesting website from a convention that was held in York on the day article 50 was sent to the EU.

www.welfareconditionality.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/Sofia-Vasilopoulou.pdf

One of the graphs is very enlightening. People were asked about their national identity and whether they intended to vote leave.

43% British
72% English
36% Scottish
47% Welsh
2% European
29% Other

It was the English who voted us out.

This thread is about Scotland and independence. There are enough 'bash Brexiters because we didn't win threads.'

And if they were asked how they intended to vote on the day that article 50 was triggered then they were a bit late.

Only 2% described themseves as European. How strange...

Somehow, I knew you would say that. You shouldn't comment on links without reading them.
The conference was held on that day, not the opinion poll.

Don't you find it interesting that 64% of Scottish people asked were going to vote for us to stay in the EU? That's why they want another referendum on leaving the UK.
When they had the last referendum in 2014 it was the English who told them that staying in the UK was the only way to ensure that they stayed in the EU. Then 72% of the English voted to leave the EU.
Lots like you, roses, who want Scotland to stay in the UK but want the UK to leave the EU. Can't you see the hypocrisy?

No, Ana.
2% of those who describe themselves as European would vote for the UK to leave the EU.
2 out of every 100 who described themselves as European....

No hypocracy at all, I would like ( like) given a chioce, that Scottish voters in any future referendum would want to stay part of the UK we are part of the same actual land and have a long shared history.
But, if they don't want to, you will not find me moaning, complaining, or rending my clothes.

Me neither!!

Well put Roses. And personally I would be very sad too.

"Propaganda works by sanctifying a single value, such as faith, or patriotism. Anyone who questions it puts themselves outside the circle of respectable opinion. The sacred value is used to obscure the intentions of those who champion it. Today, the value is freedom. Freedom is a word that powerful people use to shut down thought."

George Monbiot. It fits on other threads, too.

Cherrytree59, that's a good point about the media. They love to print inflammatory headlines that bear very little relation to reality, or even to the content of the relevant articles.

It's also known for English and Scottish editions of the same paper to print completely opposite "news".

In the 2015 general election, The Sun told its readers to vote Conservative and the Scottish Sun told its readers to vote SNP. Unfortunately far too many of them did as they were told. Hence the mess we are in now.

I have yet to meet anyone who has described themselves as European and i have lived on the Dutch/German border, England, Scotland and Northern Ireland.

So? It doesn't matter where you've lived. These are people who described themselves as European when asked, before they voted.
Whether you've met any is immaterial. I've never met Santa, but I know there is one. Same with the tooth fairy.
I've also never met anyone who listed their religion as Jedi (anyone going to own up?) but I don't deny their existence.

It's on page 4 of the link I gave.

Polls are worded in favour of the desired outcome and as we have know are not worth a jot.

No varian - simplistic and glib! It may just be that some voted SNP in 2015 because they saw the way things were going in England/UK and voted against tory misrule. Looking at how things are now I believe my vote was worthwhile.
Believe it or not some of those voters are even intelligent and thinking citizens.
However your perception of Scotland is so far removed from my experience that we'll just have to agree to differ, eh?