The Scottish Cultural Cringe

Old Stuart at Independence blog is upset - miffed even. The source of his ire are some comments I made towards the end of a post here. He responds indignantly here - objecting vociferously to any suggestion that Scot Nats might from time to time be given to a little anti-English racism (Stuart - if you ever get round to taking your head out of your rectum, I think you may come across a whiff of this...). He then whips out that perenial favourite of the Nats; anyone who has the temerity to disagree with their half-baked, inward-looking, international-situation-denying political programme is suffering from the Scottish "cultural cringe".

For any non-Scots reading this, the befuddled thinking behind this pile of crap is that anyone who doesn't want Scotland to become a banana republic led by fish-boy - except without the bananas or the warm weather - must be suffering from some kind of inferiority complex. Leaving for now the fact that the SNP can't distinguish between a political, economic or cultural argument, I deny this charge for the reasons I gave here.

Let's resolve one thing for good: I'm Scottish and British: it's not a zero-sum game (opinion pollsters ask you, do you feel more Scottish than British? As if you're supposed to say, I feel 17% more Scottish today, thank you). Neither is it a "matter of opinion" as nationalists like to say; it's a fact. Some of us are cool with that; others try and convince themselves that breaking a union that is older than the United States of America is all that is required in order for Scotland to become a beacon of economic, cultural and political success.

Those of us that are cool with the union tend to resond with that old injunction: get real...