Telegraph.
Anti-English rhetoric is at risk of “creeping” into Scottish society after police reported a record number of racist attacks against white Britons, it was claimed last night.Thing is the Scottish Nation (though not individual Scots as such) have a history of anti-English violence along with a history of sectarianism which has often been excused as apparently the English 'ruled' them from Westminster and because the English were 'occupiers' that somehow justified bigotry, hatred and discrimination. Recent cases include the 'brave' Scot who attacked an English schoolboy for wearing an England top. Along with a woman beaten up simply because she was English. All condemned of course yet a symptom of a deep malaise or perhaps an inferiority complex in Scotland itself after all defining yourself by who you hate does not seem to be terribly healthy, yet I cannot recall any other nation selling 'anyone but...' tee shirts. No, I'm not talking about incidents where people have made light-hearted comments about English people, this is obviously going beyond that, there's nothing wrong with banter and the English are no strangers to it. But you don't hear of cases where people of known Scottish origin are beaten up in England simply because they are Scottish, do you?
Police recorded 1,295 racist incidents in 2011/12 where the victim was white and British. The total is up a quarter on the previous year and 57 per cent more than in 2004/05.
The category includes both attacks on English people and incidents where the victim is Scottish and the perpetrator is from an ethnic minority.
But the vast majority of perpetrators were also white, suggesting that many cases involved racism against the English.
SNP ministers said they were “very disappointed” by the figures but opposition parties said racist attacks against English people should be treated with the same seriousness as those directed at ethnic minorities.
The overall number of racist attacks increased by 10 per cent last year, with the largest number of incidents directed against the Pakistani community.
The Scots will soon vote on going their own way, I wish them every success in this, perhaps it will help some of them at least 'grow up' Though I have my doubts...
14 annotations:
Happens everywhere:
http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/teen-scots-piper-killed-in-double-1166370
I was called, by an Englishman,
"Fat Scottish Twat"
I am not fat.
Can I obtain damages?
As the white, anglo saxon, heterosexual male is now an ethnic minority in this country (see 2011 census data for proof of this) it is hardly surprising that we should be subjected to racialism
Stonyground says:
About twenty years ago, my girlfriend* and I visited the Highlands of Scotland. We encountered a thinly disguised hostility from some folk and a really warm friendliness from others. I got the feeling that the friendly ones were embarrassed by the unfriendly ones and were doing their best to compensate for them. In any case, I can forgive the Scots an awful lot because of whisky.
*Now wife.
Some years ago the police were called to a minor fracas in a local hotel bar. No-one had been injured and plod just wanted to get on with more important things until it was reported that the assailant had shouted "Paddy Bastards" at the two Eir Lingus pilot 'victims'.
He was immediatly arrested for Racially Aggravated Blah de Blah and done, twice (one each).
Thing is we are a bit mono-cultural around here so race hate crime is a bit thin on the ground which leads to all kinds of embarrasment when the locals are asked about their failure to tackle this self evident problem.
Back O/T, I used to visit Scotland annually but can only recall a single England Vs Scotland discussion. It was in a bar in Fort William when our Scottish interlocutor rounded off his argument with the killer
"I'm Scottish...
I get paid WEEKLY!"
Ah! Fort William is a hard place to understand, until you get your head round a historical fact. Where the forts went the brothels followed.
Have a look at all the property sites (I look at it as my daily dose of wishful thinking), The staggering number of high end houses in Scotland that have come onto the market in the last year or so would indicate a significant exodus from Scotland.
Now this could simply be 'the wealthy' seeing the writing on the wall re. the Marxist Scottish parliament but 'as everybody knows' anyone rich, in business or having any power (unless a member of SNP) is in fact English (whatever their claims of parentage, birth etc.), it's telling isn't it?
Think I'm kidding? I have had many a happy hours 'discussion' with Scots regarding 'the clearances' in which I point out that the 'grasping, greedy English landlords' were in fact their own Scots elites. Watching them struggle to argue the facts is almost worth the torrents of abuse that always result.
Don't ask about the Irish reaction when the same 'facts' regarding clearances and famines are explained!!!
Personally 'll be glad if they do go it alone. No more subsidies, we can repatriate all their alcoholics. benefit scroungers et al too. Maybe we should then build a wall to maintain the border (and keep them out) - we could name it after some old Roman emperor or something, you think?
Able -spot on about the 'clearances'; it's a bit like trying to explain to Bostonians that the Irish, while undoubtedly subjected to harsh treatment and discrimination by the English, were never actually their slaves.
One of the complicating factors here is that privately-educated aristocratic Scots sound remarkably like their English counterparts - and would-be class warriors lack the ear to distinguish between the local Duke and a common-or-garden native of the Home Counties.
Political expediency means that the default setting is hostility towards anyone who sounds 'posh', including long-term settlers of modest background.
Though the political climate is now more conducive towards such an attitude, it's nothing new; I have scars that prove that it was going on a quarter of a century ago.
I dont see how damages can be claimed if it is only your feelings and sensitivities that have been hurt? An apology or a likewise retort is the way surely......
Laurie -
All condemned of course yet a symptom of a deep malaise or perhaps an inferiority complex in Scotland
Definitely an inferiority complex with a Culloden edge.
What's this "at risk of creeping in" nonsense?
Knee-jerk anti-Englishness has been an unpleasant fact of living in Scotland for as long as I can remember.
If you speak with any kind of "English" accent, even one from a posh Scottish public school, you're liable to be casually insulted and abused, or referred to as "a white settler" by these kinds of people. They're a minority but they definitely exist and always have.
Some perspective is required here. In the 2001 census there were around 400,000 English people living in Scotland. This is likely to increase further when the 2011 results are published. Last year there were 1,295 racist attacks on "white britons". Assuming these White Britons are all English this means that there are 32 racist attacks per 10,000 of the English population This is tiny.
Comapare this with the Pakistani community in Scotland. There are around 50,000 people of Pakistani origin in Scotland and there were 1,357 recorded racist attacks against this community. This correspond to 437 attacks per 10,000 of the Pakistani population - more than ten times the rate for the English.
Blacks in Scotland fare even worse although the black population in Scotland is very small.
The fact that there is any racism directed towards the English is to Scotland's shame. There simply is no equivalent in England by the English towards Scots.
@Quiet Man
I completely agree with you. I am in no way condoning racist attacks. If there was only one racist attack directed against the English (or anybody else) then that would be to Scotland's shame. I was just pointing out that the probability of a racist attack against the English is very small compared to other groups and that the anti-English thing is overstated.
I have not seen any English statistics so I cannot comment on your second sentence. All I can say is that I have been travelling to England regularly, both professionally and socially, for the last 30 years and that I personally have never been on the the receiving end of any anti-Scottish comments.
Post a Comment