Game of Thrones
The desperation to over-project onto today’s events in Edinburgh are a sign of the fear in the British establishment. The repressive police management and the attempt to ascribe political meaning to the crowds lining the streets of the Old Town are signs of a real anxiety at the process we’re in the middle of.
The historian Robert Lacey – talking after the service in St Giles’ on BBC Scotland – explained carefully that;
“the Union obliterated Scottish identity … it came back in the 1990s – many people saw it and it was a symbol of Scotland becoming more independent – breaking away from the Union but here tonight we’re seeing this ‘independent body’ turning to the old certainties … it’s plugging back into the United Kingdom’s system and there are political repercussions that are not for us to speculate on …”
Huw Edwards nodded along to this weird political propaganda.
The efforts to curate a sense of ‘national unity’ are painfully obvious and painful to witness. Whether its the hegemonic bromides of endless tributes and trivia – sterling work from Kirsty Wark and Sarah Smith speculating (and just inventing) what people think and experience emotionally – are just deeply embarrassing. The BBC Radio Scotland producer who commissioned the dog experts to come onto national radio to discuss the grief of the Corgis – who they named individually (I shit you not) – needs to have a word with themselves. This is deeply embarrassing behaviour.
The service at St Giles’ was dignified, restrained and human-scaled. Even if it was surrounded by couthy exceptionalist commentary from the Scottish commentators (all that ‘Queen of Scots’ guff) and wildly ignorant confused commentary from the non-Scottish ones, it did have some decorum, some decency about it. The crowds were here for a number of reasons but this wasn’t a display of Unionism and to describe it as such is more than hopeful.
As I wrote the other day: “the Britain that Charles the Third reigns over is one in deep social crisis more bitterly divided than anyone can remember. This doesn’t just go away as we parade endlessly in forced mourning and mandatory deference. It will still be there when the bunting goes away”
The British State are probably delighted that the Queen died at Balmoral. This way we can have a ‘Scottish moment’ and continue the facade of national unity as all the relics and remnants of the northern bit of feudal Britain parade around us.
But they are mis-stepping at every turn and not just in the weird and endless media coverage.
It’s been announced that the Stone of Destiny will be returned for the coronation, and of course that William will become the Prince of Wales, immediately inspiring a petition created after the Queen’s death calling for the Royals to “end Prince of Wales title out of respect for Wales” which surged to 10,000 signatures over just 24 hours.
The petition says that since the days of the Welsh Princes the title has been “held exclusively by Englishmen as a symbol of dominance over Wales”.
“The title remains an insult to Wales and is a symbol of historical oppression and also implies that Wales is still a principality, undermining Wales’ status as a nation and a country,” the petition’s author, Trystan Gruffydd, said.
The Royal title was originally given to Edward II of Caernarfon, son of Edward I who conquered Wales, as a means of confirming that the ‘Tywysog Cymru’ title previously held by native princes of Wales was subservient to that of the King of England.
A cannier more confident monarchy, or a more innovative British state would have used this moment to genuinely use the accession as moment to upgrade and re-define Britain and strengthen the union. Genuinely modernising the monarchy – or what Britain means would have been a defence of it. Instead it resorts to default settings.
The coronation chair was literally designed to hold the Stone of Destiny. It is a crude symbol of subjugation. When the Stone was returned to Scotland on St Andrew’s Day 1996 it was by design of Michael Forsyth, then Scottish Secretary. It was widely seen as a crude stunt, but if Forsyth thought it would stem the flow towards devolution or the Tories unpopularity he was wrong. The Conservatives would go on to lose all their Scottish seats the following May.
Britain’s impulse for centralisation and the asymmetrical nature of the power dynamics of the Union are on full display here, as are the brutalist nature of the new police powers now used to repress even the most modest dissent. This will be their death-knell. Just as we are awash with sentimentalism, Paddington Bears and a suffocating cocktail of propaganda and authoritarianism, the Union is quietly falling apart. That no-one among the executives, the spin doctors the columnists and TV producers can see this is all part of the fun.
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‘The crowds on the High Street were quiet and dignified.’
True. But I did see a photo of one green-heidit c*nt waving a bit of cardboard with ‘F*ck imper-ialism’ written on it. How quiet and dignified was that?
That was at the announcement of the accession at the Mercat Cross the other day.
Indeed. And was the crowd that attended that spectacle not quiet and respectful? Was the enthusiast who disturbed its peace not loud and disrespectful of the feelings of those there assembled?
I haven’t seen anything more disrespectful since the Larkhall Purple Heroes struck up ‘The Sash’ at the Habemus Papam in St Peter’s Square in 2013.
You identified a moment that was not at the event I was describing. If you defend freedom of speech you defend people who are offensive and rude, though I’m not sure how holding up a sign with a swear word is particularly offensive.
Like the Orangemen in St Peter’s Square, or the Rangers supporters in George Square, or the Royalists proclaiming the succession in Parliament Square… Do we defend the offence they cause Catholics, Celtic supporters, and ‘republicans’ respectively as ‘freedom of speech’. How was holding up a bit of card with ‘F*ck imper-ialism’ written on it respecting the right of the people who had peacefully gathered in Parliament Square to go about their lawful business – the speaking and hearing of a proclamation – undisturbed?
I expect you to pen an article defending people’s right to protest outside abortion clinics.
If you wish to defend the right to free speach, breach of the peace is far less concerning than actually banning protests by law, and so the abortion clinic thing should be of far more concern to you.
Maybe the Scottish government should consider abolishing ‘breach of the peace’ as a criminal offence along with the ‘not proven’ verdict. This would bring us into line with English law, where it’s not a criminal offence. In England and Wales, breach of the peace is an old concept that hasn’t been turned into a full, modern criminal offence. In England, the Crown has to seek the permission of a magistrate to impose certain conditions on our behaviour during public protests. In Scotland, it’s left to security workers on the ground to decide on their own discretion what behaviours are or aren’t acceptable in any given context.
Under Scots law, breach of the peace includes any conduct that can cause alarm to ordinary people and threaten serious disturbance to the community. This can include shouting and swearing, sending or brandishing abusive messages, and brandishing weapons. For the crime to be committed, the conduct has to be ‘genuinely alarming and disturbing, in its context, to any reasonable person’. It’s up to the courts (rather than you or I) to judge whether or not the conduct concerned is genuinely alarming and disturbing etc., and the onus is on the Crown to prove it. Proving that conduct is genuinely harmful is notoriously difficult, especially when the harm is emotional rather than physical, which is one of the reasons that the Crown in Scotland is keen to see the ‘not proven’ verdict abolished as a check on convictions.
The Scottish legal profession has called into question the looseness of the legal definition of breach of the peace and the harm that it can cause, pointing out that this looseness ‘is often abused or misinterpreted by the arresting police officers’. The whole issue of our liberty and its protections needs to be addressed by the Scottish government urgently.
The ball is firmly on the foot of the Queen in the North as she decides who sits on the Iron Throne and fights of the NightWalkers at the same time.
Bend the Knee, Scotland!
Papco: Can you please explain your post. Who is the queen of the North ? A train or a football club ? Iron throne ? Nightwalker?
220912 not Papco ?
It’s an allusion to A Song of Ice and Fire, a series of fantasy novels by George Martin. Never read it myself.
Watch tonights Newsnight with Victoria Derbyshire interviewing. Two guests Lord Robertson of Labour and Michael Keating Professor of Politics at Aberdeen university. Derbyshire questions Keating on the likelihood of Scottish Independence when there is such support for the monarchy in Scotland evidenced by the crowds visiting the Royal Mile. He speaks convincingly straight out, pointing out the difference between the constitutional monarchy and the political union. They are both two different things. Independence is very real standing at around 50% with support even higher in the younger age groups. Robertson didn’t get a look in. When they returned to the London studio the look on Mark Urbans face said it all.
Fed up with the “intellectual” ever cynical, totally obtuse 220912 and now Papco arrives on the scene …who are these folk? Why do they bother obviously Indy sites ….do they get paid to be as boring and nihilistic as they are .?
The presence of dissenting voices is important to ‘indy sites’; without it they become self-enclosed, self-validating ‘bubble’ communities.
So, offering up dissenting opinions here is fine, because they are yours; but dissenting opinions in Parliament Square aren’t okay?
Precisely! It’s the disingenuousness I can’t stomach. Why, indeed, is it alright for green-heidit woman to protest her anti-monarchism by waving a bit of cardboard on which sweary words have been written in Parliament Square during a monarchist gathering to proclaim a new monarch when it wouldn’t be alright for an Orange band to protest its anti-papism by striking up ‘The Sash’ in St Peter’s Square during a papist gathering to proclaim a new pope? As Duncan says below, what’s sauce for the goose…
What do you think we are witnessing on the BBC and MSM at the moment, how many dissenting voices have you witnessed. The presence of dissenting voices is important to the debate around the Union and the so-called British establishment elite, without it they become self-enclosed, self-validating ‘bubble’ communities. What’s good for the goose.
I’ve no idea what you’re witnessing on the BBC and MSN at the moment. I don’t take my news and current affairs content from either of those two providers.
The presence of dissenting voices is indeed important to the polarising debate around the Union and Independence (and ‘I’ present several different dissenting voices on platforms on both sides of the debate). Without it, each ‘pole’ does indeed become a self-enclosed, self-validating ‘bubble’ community, and dialogue between them becomes impossible. That’s my point precisely.
Alice. 220912 has a need to comment on everyone and everything on this site. He/she comes over as a very sad individual who probably has nobody that will listen to his self important views so he uses this forum. He is in short a bore.
I appreciate the site controllers do not want to block anyone so I would just ignore 220912 or whatever date he wishes to comment under.
Alice: They are one and the same person. Add John Learmonth. popko and all numbered posters. The SAME INDIVIDUAL.
220192’s MBE is in the post.
@Alec Lomax, interesting point: how does Charles III repopulate Elizabeth II’s putrid pyramid of patronage?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patronage
There is a defining moment of the newly-crowned Henry V’s reign in Shakespeare’s play Henry IV part 2, when once-was Prince Harry has the opportunity to take revenge on his erstwhile chastiser, the Lord Chief-Justice. Meanwhile, an influx of would-be favourites dream of honours. My reading of the play is that Henry V partly banishes Falstaff because the court is so toxic that his old friend would not survive long amongst the real vipers. The royal prerogatives for appointments are sweeping powers indeed.
A PM who thinks the way out of the UK’s energy crisis – the chief acute driver of our economic crisis – is fracking was installed more or less simultaneously as a monarch from the Jimmy Goldsmith school of noblesse-oblige environmentalism, who detests fracking and has a decades-long record of pushing the constitutional boundaries of his role. Charles look frankly fucked off during his confirmation, or whatever you call that thing with the “funny moment” with the inkstand where he said “approve” a lot.
I’m not noticing any lefties pick up on this contradiction. As usual, most want to reduce the world to 1’s and 0’s. One can be a republican and have no illusions that Charles is astute. But we should expect that Charles is going to be politically “analogue.” He basically will be the monarch of the Waitrose demographic, rebuilding the monarchy’s social license in that classic way the 19th Windsors did with their strategy of petit bourgeois relatability. And that, too will challenge the left’s binaries.
One green-heidit c*nt.. …..that would be a Scot refusing to be hypnotised and fighting for the Scots to survive this insidiously dangerous ‘royal’ performance. When you fight for freedom ……’quiet and dignity’ goes oot the windae…I can just see Robert the Bruce….’Now folks I want you to fight and kill the f****n English in a dignified and quiet way… oh and don’t disrespect their feelings……..’ nah I don’t think so….
We are not talking about good manners ..we are talking about the survival of the Scottish nation.
For Scotland!
PS…grieving corgis?…..watched racing on the telly..from a ‘muted stable’ they said…I was doubled with laughter…
But, apart from the bigots within the independence movement, we’re not talking about fighting and killing ‘the f****n English’; we’re talking about shaping Scotland as an open and equal democratic society, which embraces a plurality of identities without any being privileged over any other.
Subjugate people by moving a stone around?
Seriously? That’s like subjugating kids by taking them to a pantomime.
I guess that Jimmy6 took his jewlery with him when he moved to London in 160whatever, as well.
No its a symbol of subjugation to steal an powerful iconic artefact and then construct a chair to sit on it : )
Oh no it’s not! 🙂
If anything, it’s a symbol of comical mysticism. But if anyone thinks they really are being subjugated by a rock, they will worry themselves into an early grave.
Symbolism is the use of symbols to represent ideas or qualities. I think it’s pretty clear that Edward I’s removal of the stone (itself a symbol of Scottish kingship) to England and its subsequent installation in his new throne was intended to represent an assertion of his feudal superiority over the kings of Scotland, which he could claim as a consequence of his having been invited by the Guardians of Scotland on the death of Queen Margaret to nominate her successor from among the rival candidates. All these centuries later, the continues to be an important symbol of Scotland’s national rebirth or risorgimento among the more fascistic elements of Scottish nationalism, who sing of their rising now against the foreign invader to be the nation again.
We already know that the top royals would not pass any sane fit-and-proper-person test to work in the NHS or run a football club. But what we know is just the tip of the iceberg, and makes our royals such a dangerous liability. Others will know. Russia can hold a Soviet-era royal kompromat like a sword of Damocles over the heads of UK authorities, to be dropped at the time of maximum convenience for them, or just kept as a deterrent and coercive instrument. Such compromising material covering generations does not matter so much in the case of undynastic politicians.
I still think the Paddington Bear stunt was royal propagandists shooting themselves in the foot (perhaps both feet). Paddington may turn out to be the most enduring relateable performer and a better candidate for head of state, without a skeleton-crammed closet or a history of violence.
Even Al Jazeera English has gone a little mad in its coverage. But the tide will turn, and if Charles III thinks he can hold it back, that is the moment to be washed away.
Great piece, Mike.
The caravan has now moved on: there were few signs left of it this afternoon in the Meadows, other than a few toilet cubicles waiting to be removed. An upbeat jazz band was playing.
So, what can we take from these few days? One aspect not commented upon is how Scotland has played a central role in these events, and how some of its institutions have as a result grown in stature and relevance, taking on some of the hallmarks of statehood. I’m not sure this is what our rulers in Westminster had ever intended.
Tune in, turn on, drop out.
I have “tuned in” on occasion during this grief-fest. Auld Scotia was discovered by Metropole types(did they empty London?), “turned on” that we had history, geography, even that Scotland had sunshine surprised and amazed them.
The BBC “dropped out” of journalism and wallowed in its Imperialist role—propagandists for the State.
It was a relay of manic, babbling sycophants—who knew for sure, the late Queens opinions—who are acting as Nat-Finder Generals—though not English or British nationalists as, of course, they don’t exist.
Not for them to question arrests for “bad opinions”. Doff yer cap, and bow your head as your betters pass by.
Now the circus has moved on to London, and the dial on the talking-heads will be turned to the max.
When the crowd leaves the arena and the smoke clears, a certain Liz Truss will be left standing—-naked and alone at the centre of the stage.
Clown Boris is dead. God bless Clown Liz.
I like your last sentence, Mike, “The crowds were quiet and dignified; they knew they were at a funeral”. You write well. Although I would like the monarchy to continue, in a modified form, with major political and economic reform as part and parcel, the overblown rhetoric, the saturation coverage, the police serious overreaction to unthreatening protest, the unnecessary cancellations of the few enjoyments that citizens have nowadays – that all brings the system, including the monarchy, into disrepute and invites challenges. It certainly annoys me immensely.
I have said for a long time, many years, that the monarchy and the Union will fail or vanish not by the action of some rebellious republicanism like you lot, but by the sheer uncaring nastiness of a crooked, smug, greedy and entitled power elite – the Tory party and tragically the Labour party too, the corporates, the Murdochs and the media that support them and this sociopathic system – and who in causing their own ultimate downfall, will bring everything which they so profess to love and wish to protect to come tumbling down with them in the chaos they have worked so hard to bring about.
As Oscar Wilde so nearly said:
Yet each man kills the thing he loves
By each let this be heard,
The Tories do it with the crook
The poisoned pot they’ve stirred.
I agree with much of what you say , Mike , but I have been to ( too ) many funerals and if I witnessed crowds of ”mourners” raising their phones to capture every moment of the occasion , I would be appalled !
I’m not sure all that many of those who turned out in the Royal Mile to witness the Queen’s ‘passing’ were there to mourn. I suspect they were there to participate in what they considered to be an historic occasion and were recording a digital memory of their participation. But, of course, we have no way of knowing what their several purposes in being there were. All that matters and all that we need concern ourselves about is that they weren’t doing any harm.