Serious … and Not
There’s an iconic scene in The West Wing where President Bartlett, coming up on his re-election campaign, is lectured by Toby Ziegler, his Communications Director, about what the forthcoming campaign is actually about.
He cautions his candidate not to pretend to be lightweight and folksy. “You’re a heavy-weight. Make this campaign about “being engaged…and not, serious…and not…educated and not.”
To which Martin Sheen replies that he doesn’t want “to be killed.”
This scene jumped out at me because one of my other summer pursuits had been reading Tim Shipman’s trilogy (so far) about the UK Tory Government and Brexit. While I’ve been reading, I’ve been thinking what an essentially frivolous and unserious collection of people have been in sole charge of UK National Destiny since 2015 until just the other day. Even well before the patent and foreseen absurdities of Boris Johnson and Liz Truss, you get the impression of people like Theresa May and David Davis acting entirely theatrically in government and in negotiation with the bemused adults in charge of European countries, of the people who ran Britain being profoundly and obviously unserious about who they were, what they were doing, and who they purported to be representing.
And this was the wider UK context in which the post referendum Scottish Body politic was operating. Let’s face it, every day felt like a gift to the argument for Independence. And yet, stubbornly, the polls never moved…we seemed stuck with a referendum that had been numerically clear but culturally indecisive. And there were many on “our” side of the binary dialectic who quite sincerely believed that with “one more push” the argument for independence would achieve the weight of electoral certainty. Mandates were claimed and the seriousness of Nicola Sturgeon compared to the ludicrous corruption of her British opponents seemed clear as day.
And yet…
It was perfectly clear in electoral terms that after the semi-disaster of 2017 suffered by the SNP in the General Election that any talk of 2014 referendum revisited was purely performative from the top of the nationalist movement (including Alec Salmond’s thankfully abortive attempts) and wishful thinking from below. The political trap, it is now clear, that we fell into, was to take what we felt – or pretended to feel – had “nearly”happened in September 2014 far too seriously.
Looking back at the referendum campaign now, it was only once, on a Sunday morning in September 2014, when I happened to bump into one of the serious players in that campaign (not from the SNP as it happens) that I heard anyone seriously say they thought that “Yes “ was going to win.
On the day itself, while I was doing some performative Get out the Vote campaigning in a hard-to-reach tenement block in my neighbourhood – where even on the 18th of September it was apparently news t many folk that there was something going on that day – I entered a storeroom to get a re-stock of leaflets and standing there, all on her own, was Nicola Sturgeon…someone who I admired for years, incidentally, and with whom I’d never had a one to one conversation where there wasn’t a lot of folk around.
And what did I do with this dramatic opportunity? Did I say anything encouraging or optimistic? Well, her face told me not to. Her face, as drawn and tired as I ever saw it until the day she resigned, told me to bugger off sharpish. So I did.
And, of course, now I draw a line back from that moment on September 18th 2014, when I knew we’d lost, and I knew she knew we’d lost, to the 28th of March 2023 when we definitively lost her as well as the campaign for which she stood.
It was the end of an era in Scotland, but it was also the end of a performance. Let me be clear, we were NEVER going to win for “Yes” in 2014. And the subsequent period when we were faced with a profoundly unserious UK Government, with Brexit, Covid and cakeism fooled some of us…well, okay, me…into thinking that the British project was surely done…and that we in Scotland would shortly find and see ourselves in need of a lifeboat towards democracy, social justice, dealing with the climate emergency and the movement of people it would provoke, and…well…SERIOUSNESS!
Now we find ourselves at a present tense that both demands a little honesty, and, let’s be honest, affords us a little time. We still have yet to find out whether Starmer et al are actually serious people, or only performatively serious people. (I’ve quite enjoyed the no-nonsense attitude being displayed to the opportunist, performative fascists online of late over their cynical manipulations in the recent riots.) It is quite possible to reinterpret “the referendum wave” of 2011 to 2023 as itself performative, itself un-serious. That we were doing our tartan clad bit in a Trumpian pageant of populist pretense. That the historic role of the SNP as existing to put pressure on Labour from the left (which was always why I’d voted for them from 1987 onwards) was still actually the only game in town. That we lived in an extractive economy, not just in terms of hydro-carbons, but in terms of extracting UK government expenditure (including devolution) to make up for having our “real” industries devastated. And hence that the Independence debate was a “blip”…that nothing has really changed.
After all, the Blairitres are back in charge of Britain (by one interpretation) and the Democrats in the US have dumped the basic Trump-lite unseriousness of Joe Biden to actually confront the racial and gender issues which have “seriously” defined American political culture since Clinton…and especially since Obama.
So are we in the backwater now, having tried the Humza and Green coalition experiment, back in the safe hands of John Swinney, awaiting developments in the “real world” inside the M25? Do the events of (as I write) the last month…the lancing of the fascist boil in inchoate reaction to the Southport horror…define a moment of seriousness for the UK government, and consequently for our being serious about what to actually try to DO with devolution? Is the new “realism” the only game now in town?
Honestly, seriously, I don’t know yet. I think we have changed, that this is not the same kind of Scotland as it was ten or twenty years ago (let alone the exclusionary assumptions of the Scotland I grew up in.) Will the SNP re-invent itself sufficiently so that we positively want to vote FOR them in 2026 as a new government, rather than liming unconvincingly into a future defined by nothing better being available? Or will it descend further into the unseriousness which has defined it for a while now? Will UK Labour rise to the occasion, despite my and everybody I know doubting it on the best of historical grounds? Again, nobody actually knows yet. And I don’t think that sneering before they’ve got their feet under the cabinet table is culturally or politically wise, however justified it may or may not turn out to be.
But a serious programme for dealing with serious problems might well be a start.
We are supported only by our readers. We don't have corporate backers and we don't take advertising, so we rely entirely on your support.
Help to support independent Scottish journalism
As I have said before here, the overriding problem is the fact that (whether you are on the Yes or No side regarding independence), all our political parties now dance to the tune of international so-called ‘investors’ who are in reality self-serving organised criminals. The rot runs so deep that we are ruled by a parcel of rogues, bought and sold these days for American gold. And that gold belongs to the latter day robber barons, the plutocrats that own America. This is why we see a succession of clowns and puppets becoming prime minister. And Starmer is as much a puppet as any, as is demonstrated by his weaponising of ‘antisemitism’. He does as he’s told.
It now seems clear the US ‘robber barons’ now own the UK (and Scotland within it) too. There is not a single politician or public servant in Scotland actually willing to stand up to them. The King actually promoted their so-called “Great Reset’. It means that whatever these criminals want, they get. And they want to own and control everything and indeed everyone because they see the entire planet as a ‘resource’ to be plundered for their pleasure. They make sure that as little as possible trickles down, and as much as possible is pumped up. Corbyn had to be destroyed because ‘For the many, not the few’ was a slogan that rang true for a lot of people. It made him a threat to the wealthiest and most powerful.
The use of ‘antisemitism’ as a weapon of choice is significant because anti-semitism as a concept itself a fascist one. It identifies and others the Jews as a ‘race’ and associates them all with Israel’s crimes. This is more or less guaranteed to stir up hatred against them. Judaism is not a ‘race’ – it is a religion and an ancient cultural heritage. It is even the root from which Christianity and then Islam developed. There are black and Asian Jews, there are Palestinian Jews. They are the victims of this racism as much as the rest of us. The ‘idea of a ‘semitic’ race may not have been invented by the Nazis but they certainly used it for propaganda purposes. And of course, any reaction to the horrors of genocide is then blamed squarely on Muslims. ‘Anti-semitism’ is actually a mark of fascism, a psychological weapon that seeks to divide and rule and divert attention from the real criminals.
Fascism is essentially rule by violence for private profit. It is inseparable from corporate capitalism. The association with extreme nationalism is, like racism merely a cynical front. In reality it is supra-national and seeks to end national sovereignty along with any other possible challenge to its totalitarianism. It has tied up national governments in knots with international treaties that permit corporations and their owners to rob the entire planet blind, insisting that ‘shareholder’ (now stakeholder) value is more important than anything else, people, planet, the future, and that it justifies any action whatsoever. Secret ‘courts’ are somehow permitted to fine sovereign governments if they do not follow orders. It is utterly ruthless and reckless and it has beaten our politicians and society at large into submission. And the methods used are there for all to see. It is essentially ‘shock and awe’, demonstrations that they will do as they please and no-one, not even the ICJ can stop them. Human rights, democracy, the rule of law only apply is they serve the plutocrats’ interest. We are cautioned to surrender.
Incidentally the genocide in Palestine is surely not unconnected with the discovery of natural gas deposits there, which Israel wants for itself, and even more, wishes to deny to the Palestinians. I understand that the rights to extract them have been sold by Israel to a consortium of companies, including BP. And they (and their American and British funders) are determined to have these resources – regardless of the consequences.
All this has real consequences for people and planet everywhere, as I have discovered myself. My personal experiences over the last four years have led me to the conclusion that Scotland is a corrupt country ruled by and for corporate interests at public expense – and the SNP and Greens are complicit in this. They have failed to deliver independence, not only from Westminster, but even more so from organised crime. They are now far too compromised and fearful to stand up for us, or even themselves. I don’t claim that they are willing participants in this horror, but they seem to be too fearful to stand up and be counted. As things stand, I spoiled my ballot in the recent election and could never vote for any of them again. I am currently looking for ways to hold the Scottish government publicly to account. I’d be keen to hear from anyone with legal training who might help.
We need a new party, a party for planet and people together (not separated). Where we listen to each other and to the planet itself instead of endless fight or flight. I propose that the party’s first principle, that any member must sign up to, is the Claim of Right – the sovereignty of the people of Scotland within its borders. But beyond that, the principle needs to extend to the over-arching sovereignty of the planet itself. Any sovereignty we exercise must recognise that. It ultimately belongs to no-one but itself and we have a duty of care. Instead of destroying it further in the name of ‘saving’ it, there is an urgent need to take back responsibility and be the change; and refuse to be intimidated. Independence from the oligarchs is not about ‘separatism’ or being ‘anti-‘ any group of people. It’s just about recovering our humanity and ‘taking back control’ of the means of production – to decentralise them and empower people. This brings responsibility. We need to look at the legal fiction of the ‘limited company’ which exists to avoid that. And we are all of us ‘stakeholders’ in our future.
It’s great to see people in England quietly standing up to fascism – that is the spirit to capture. Nae Pasaran. We need to prove we are not too fearful, too wee, too poor, too stupid to exercise our right of self determination and build a Scotland on the basis of mutual aid that can be an inspiration to the rest of the world. No doubt we can expect, as in many other countries, interference, attempts to provoke chaos and ‘regime change’. But all over the world, the rule of the robber barons is now finally starting to collapse.
I’ve no idea whether Kamala Harris is really a breath of fresh air, or just Big Tech and Big Pharma’s candidate to oppose the oil industry’s Trump. But it hardly matters because the people of the world have had enough, a massive change is coming and the whole 19th /20th c materialistic philosophy that supports the present situation is finally falling apart. By their fruits shall ye know them, and we cannot be forced to consume fruits are at best, worthless and at worst, poisonous. Capitalism – and its handmaiden, fascism, – have reached the end of their product lifecycle.
Was it really all ‘performative’ and ‘unserious’? Were we really just pawns in a situationist spectacle? That we might have been taken in by our own hubris is a fair point. However, that it all meant nothing much and that we are now back to where we started is surely not right. For a start, attitudes to independence have shifted decisively, among younger people especially. I suspect that the next push will come unannounced, from a direction we are quite unable to predict, for the simple reason that the underlying problems – is it too old-hat to call them contradictions? – have not gone away. Situationism is good fun, but you really need a good dose of dialectical and historical materialism to make any sense of it all.
Thanks Paddy – yes I agree that “it all meant nothing much and that we are now back to where we started is surely not right”.
Scotland is currently stuck but Scotland was fundamentally changed by 2014.
It all sounds so stale. If the independence absolutists ever stop gabbering to no-one but themselves it would be a step towards progress but they look incapable/terrified of stepping anywhere outside of ‘all my friends agree with me’ . Meanwhile, the SNP has given up on the subject (the occasional couple? of pages of propoganda that almost no-one reads, and the tiny readership don’t take seriously is the total of their independence campaign). In lieu of anyone bothering to engage with the public, hibernation is a chartible description. Decadence is probably more accurate.
You make a very good point about independence movement talking to themselves. I think many in the movement are using this as a type of comfort blanket rather than addressing the real questions that have to be answered.
The polls show the country has been split approximately 50:50 on matter of independence since 2014.
The polls will not shift unless independence movement can convince those opposed to independence on practicalities not principle (soft No’s) that independence will benefit their family and community economically and socially. The first step to doing this is being open and finding out these people’s concerns.
From the general election results it would also appear that many on the Yes side do not see independence as an immediate priority or as being achievable in near future. This leaves the SNP fighting primarily Labour as to which party can manage Scotland better within devolution settlement as writer comments. The tide is going out for SNP, at present, electorally as being seen as best managers of Scotland- not surprising after 17 years in power and current economic background.
I also agree with PaddyF that future circumstances will change current rather depressing situation. The question I am asking myself is whether the SNP and wider independence movement will be in a position to persuade sufficient of the electorate of the case for independence when this happens?
So why are you still here?
I don’t really understand what ‘serious’ and ‘unserious’ means in this article. For example, the distinction drawn between the ‘seriousness of Nicola Sturgeon’ and unseriousness of May and Davis seems, well, not a serious observation.
I think author has confused lack of preparation to deal with Brexit for a lack of seriousness.
I would suggest he could have used Johnson & Truss as examples of politician’s who were not serious
“Let me be clear, we were NEVER going to win for “Yes” in 2014. ”
What does this mean exactly? 45:55 seems fairly close to me. Is the author hinting at something else? Dark forces? Or did he have crystal ball?
Better Together used an American polling system they recognised the numbers needed and how to get those numbers/votes
They were no doubt shocked that only 13% identified as British which shaped their campaign
With over 55s being most sceptical pensions
New Scots loss of EU membership and paint Yes as anti-English both these groups voted 75% No
Yes it was closer than they thought
But they were always going to win
Yes failed to address pensions. Still haven’t
And failed to play the patriotic card for fear of upsetting New Scots and being criticised by media
Remember Brown was not so scared “a no vote is a patriotic vote”
One issue that no one will touch is that a majority of Those born in Scotland voted Yes
But New Scots carried the vote
Which also explains why polls have not shifted as the older generation have died out they are replaced by folk moving here who are naturally more attached to the idea of Britain
Change the minds of those 2 demographics
But the big question to be answered is
They won’t allow a second referendum
Asking nicely by sending requests won’t work
It has to be a wider movement trade unions Church charities etc and
would need international recognition
We also need media because the constant drip drip of Scotland is poor Scotland can’t
Does register.
Perhaps we need to suffer a Labour government in Power in both parliaments
To realise just how powerless the Scottish parliament can be when taking direct orders from another
Dougie – I am genuinely a bit confused by your post.
You lament the fact that people that were not born in Scotland voted No in 2014 while also suggesting that the Yes campaign needs to be more patriotic. I would have thought that it would be very difficult to encourage more people who have moved to Scotland to vote Yes by adopting a more patriotic approach?
IMO the case for Scottish independence rests primarily on five key issues:
1.Democratic case – the electorate of Scotland getting the parliament it votes for. (case is temporarily diminished after recent GE).
2.Economic- why is a country with Scotland’s resources not more prosperous?
3.Social- why are public services not better and why is there still so much poverty and inequality in Scotland? Resolving this does rely on both 1 & 2 above.
4.international – Scotland has different outlook on international relationships than current UK governments in a number of areas The approach to EFTA, EU, nuclear weapons etc are areas where electorate in Scotland have different priorities.
5.Cultural- Scotland has a different (unique) cultural past and present to remainder of UK. The only way to allow this culture to flourish (rather than be depressed) is through independence. This is where patriotic aspirations can be included but it must be inclusive so not to make those not born in Scotland feel excluded or threatened.
I completely agree with your last two paragraphs and would add that this process should also include’Soft No’ voters from all political backgrounds.
I agree with that, and I think the concept of ‘agency’ is crucial. People in Scotland do not have nearly enough agency at the personal, community and national levels.
Graeme – some updated version of the constitutional convention which did so much of the groundwork for devolution after 1979?
The fiasco with the Israeli ambassador may prove to be one of the final fruits of Sturgeonism. Instead of steadying the ship, John Swinney and Angus Robertson have driven the SNP onto the rocks. If it is to have any future success, Scotland’s independence movement will have to be rebuilt from the bottom up.