FREEDOM!!!! [4]

{{ Its pretty obvious what they are doing. And not coincidental they did it right after meeting the man spearheading the Unionist campaign in Scotland. Also the Royals have a lot of invested financial interest in land in Scotland and the Royal rights to all the coastline among other things. An independent Scotland would probably have some very different views on them paying proper taxes, and not getting all the coast line for free. }}

A separated Scotland would complicate things quite a bit for them, wouldn't it?

{{ Indeed it would, they have royal palaces here like Balmoral, Holyrood, the Crown own huge areas of land and as I mentioned the coast line. All of which is bound to be looked at closely and to feature in necessary negotations bewteen Scotland and RUK following a yes vote if it happens. Not to mention there is no guarantee the people of Scotland would vote to retain a monarchy at all as Head of State after independence. }}

Fair and balanced on indyref2 and the neverendum - Scot goes pop, I'm finally compelled to admit it: the SNP leadership have become the biggest obstacle to independence

https://scotgoespop.blogspot.com/2021/06/im-finally-compelled-to-admit-it-snp.html

{{ As that piece points out the polling doesnt show a clear majority for independence, its still hovering between 48% and at best 52%. Thats a highly risky situation in which to hold it if its another loss that will effectively kill it for decades, the political wind will be gone from the sails and the argument that the SNP will just keep asking till they get the answer they want will gain significantly more strength, as will the argument the country cant afford to be in a state of perpetual constituional debate and uncetainty if people have voted twice to remain already.
There is no  point, no matter how much pro-indy party members might want it in risking the only chance we might get on such a tight margin unless push comes to shove.

The best strategy therefore is to move the numbers. The way to doing that is what the SNP say they are doing but havent felt the timing rght, what with pandemic and all, to focus the public on yet- which is a detailed plan and explanations. Clearly outlaying and detailing all the answers to questions folk have- what currency, who will be central bank, how will we cut debt and balance the books, will any services be cut, will there be tax changes, how will pensions be funded, at what level will benefits be set, will we retain the monarch and what role will they play, how will the miltary function, how do we attract inward investment, what will our busines rates be and capital gains? All those sort of questions have to be honestly laid out, pros and cons. Then the dial may shift favourable enough to hold the referendum in 2023. Scotland will not vote for drastic change unless it has a clear idea of whats it voting for, patriotism alone is not enough to get a solid majority on side.

And by 2023, with that information made available and openly debated, Boris and his Tory party and the consequnces of their decisions and of Brexit may be coming home to roost further boosting the desire to detach from Westminster rule. And what occurs in Norethern Ireland will have an effect too.

And the unionist side will probably not be represented by Westminster boogeyman Johnston, or even Scottish Gove, but by the likes of Gordon Brown and Ruth Davidson. Brown had a big impact in the last days of the last referndum, many believing his 'Vow' speech swung the vote for the Union, and Ruth Davidson is the most popular Scottish Tory leader they have had since Annabel Goldie, with the difference Ruth also won considerably more votes for the Scottish Tories.
They will be prepared if the answers are not there to these questions and independence will fail again.

The SNP will have to hold off till post pandemic, its simply still the priority right now- then they will need time to properly outline and make the case and provide the detail inorder to push the numbers a lot higher. Hence why I beleive Strugeon will follow her plan and do as she claims they are, preparing said information for release and push for a referendum in 2023/24 prior to a general election.}}

{{ Really enjoy this guys vids, he brings interesting perspectives to Scottish history. }}

Apparently about 500 of 100 000 paying members voted (probably a majority in elected position in or for the party), but the rank-and-file has spoken. "Please go slow."

https://twitter.com/ChrisMcEleny/status/1437534575253671938

{{ Party conference for all parties is mainly for show and for the party itself. But they are right in this case. Alba and its supporters might jump up and down demanding a referendum tomorrow but if they got it theyd lose, again, badly. The polling isnt there, the case hasnt been made.
That was Salmonds biggest problem last time, for a man with a history in finance he couldnt answer the most basic questions about currency, pensions, taxation, NHS and much more. And with a mix of post Brexit fall out still impacting the economy and society and combined with the uncertainty around covid and its economic impact there is not a snowballs chance in hell that a YES vote would win at this time in my view.
We wont get another shot at this if NO wins again for a very, very long time, so there is no point of going to the people if the case has not been made enough for polling to show at least a consistent 60% majority for YES. And thats yet to happen.

What has started again is the White Paper, civil servants were taken off the case for independence to deal with the pandemic as a priority, but are starting to return to work on it. Its aim is to lay out an honest assessment of the pros and cons of independence to put to the people to decide. Hence why yesterday Swinney told us that it would take a minimum of three years for Scotland to set up and begin printing its own cuurency, and that until then we would continue to use the pound, meaning we would have no Central Bank and the Bank of England would control interest rates and the like for that period with no say from Scotland (this is the same way Ireland went about it so its not untried) but its an honest assessment of pros and cons. And if the argument is to be made and won this time, we are going to need that sort of detail in answeing folks questions, good and bad and for folk to decide for themselves.}}

If there's not a very clear majority for independence, such a big change should NOT happen. I'd say you'd need at least a 2/3 majority for making such a big step. Large changes inevitably carry pain; a vote of 52% is insufficient to even consider such a thing.

{{ There is a risk in setting a bar- in 1979 Scotland had is first vote on a devolved parliament, th vote was won with just over 50% but was repealed by Westminister on the grounds not a high enough proportion voted for. Mainly as the bar they set was higher than any elected government had ever achieved.
Allowing Westminster to set a bar on if they accept the result is a risky business. And I'd hate to think what would happen if they set it at 70% or something and yes won by 69% and were denied independence. I suspect that would lead to real trouble.
Sturgeon is a canny politician though, she isnt going to hold a vote whilst the polls are so close to 50%. She doesnt want even a narrow victory, she wants a clear unequivical one. And for her that means persuading the people by laying out the full case, leaving the SNP less open to the sort of arguments made last time on the economy and stuff they had no or insufficient answers for.
Boris therefore by denying a referndum is helping her a lot, she can still give the red meat to the harcore base of the party, setting a date for when she wants one (2 years for now) and laying out things like the White Paper, making the general case, whilst at the same time she gets the breathing space required by Boris' continued denial to build up the numbers for independence. }}

{{ Question for the US hobbits is the influence of David Hume on the creation of America taught in schools? }}

Briefly mentioned. Locke and Rosseau get more of the credit.

{{ We don't have any Dutch folk on here, do we? Read something in a comment to a youtube vid that struck me as interesting, but would need someone Dutch (or Belgian) to confirm if it's true. Anyhow this was the comment- }}

'in the Netherlands and Belgium, Scotland is more likely to be called a "bezet" part of the UK rather than "verenigd". The word bezet means something closer to "occupied" where verenigd is closer to "united with".' - Tamas Marcuis

{{ Good example of why Sturgeon remains popular in Scotland in comparison to Boris. She just went and did voluntary work at a vaccine centre, without the media- members of the public leaked it. In response she tweeted-

'Did a ‘volunteering’ session at the @eicc vaccine centre earlier. Not sure I was much help but it gave me good insight into how it all works (v efficiently) and to say a massive thank you to everyone doing truly heroic work.'

Cant imagine Boris doing similar without bringing most of Fleet St with him, grandstanding it and basically just getting in the way of those trying to do the actual real work.}}

I dont particularly want to get into this debate here, but Scotland needs to ditch Stonewall asap, its gone mad and bad.

{{ stonewall are a charity, nothing directly to do with the Scottish Government. In a broad sense I have nothing against them personally, seem to do generally good work- for example right now their main thing is lobbying Uk governments to ban conversion therapy.
The conversation over trans rights will work its way through. My own view for example is just have a third gender for stuff- so just as in sport now there are mens, womens and various categories of disabled sports where each gender competes against those of the same gender, so I think trans folk in sport should compete against other trans folk. sport is afterall about sporting fairness, a level playing field. Same goes for facilities like changing rooms or toilets- we have mens and womens and disabled toilets, why not have a trans version? Solves all the arguments and everyone is on an equal fair footing and treated the same.
But these sort of discussions are ongoing, and will be for some time I reckon.
I have no issues with any charity lobbying government, its part of what they do.

As for the SNP government the fuss is around their Gender Recognition reform Bill which allows for folk to self identify without medical diagnosis (worth noting an almost identical bill passed into law in Ireland of all places in 2015 with no fuss whatsoever, and the same law was attempted in england but failed to pass thanks to Tories) the bill is still in consultation, trying to bring all sides together to work out fair compromises on issues of contention with thee SNP's current position being outlined as- “to tackle transphobia head-on through education and make changes to the GRA, in consultation with trans people, women, equality groups, legal and human rights experts”. At the same time, it committed to safeguard “the rights or protections that women currently have under the Equality Act”.- Guardian

Which seems fair enough to me. I wont decry a proposed law with good intentions till I see the finished bill and what it implies. But there is nothing in it which I feel is any threat to anyone at this point in time. Certainly not biolgical womens rights which are in fact being strengthened.}}

At the convention I was at I wandered into one of the few "gender neutral" factory sized toilets, did a double take and walked back out, saw the sign this time then thought "I'm here and it's a several minute walk to the next one" so went back in.  I think most people were doing the in-pop out-back in move.  Assiduously avoiding eye contact, not even the quick nod you might get walking in and out of your normal setup.

Most restaurants are dealing with it by installing multiple single person rooms with handwashing outside.  The group facilities are producing glazed eyes and slight hidden embarrassment, not unlike peeing yourself then rearranging clothing to cover it up.

Pettytyrant101 wrote:{{  Certainly not biolgical womens rights which are in fact being strengthened.}}

ok as an opener, I fully support the rights of trans people to live in dignity and equality. Just in case it isn't clear later.

Biological womens rights are not being strengthened, that's the problem, they are being worryingly eroded. I have done a lot of research on this btw. But I wont be putting forward any other arguments because this isn't the right forum, and it will inevitably get unpleasantly messy because I have very strong views on the matter. I will just put it out there that I am a gender critical feminist or what trans activists call a 'terf' . I am against the bullying of Lesbian academics like Kathleen Stock. I fully support the LGB Alliance. I fully support J K Rowling, Helen Joyce and Graham Linehan (the author of Father Ted). That's my stance. It is uncompromising and therefore considering everything, its best if I keep any further comments to myself.

Just use common sense. People need to be accepted as their gender identity as much as possible. But many men (not all) who have transed into women will still have a strongly masculine build. For women who have been under threat of men in their past this can be intimidating. The need for understanding is a two-way street.

For non professional sports people should be able to shrug it off. For professional sports it's more of an issue because of the money involved, but since I think the whole professional sports fascination is BS I don't give a rat's ass and am happy to laugh at the squirming.

{{ Reasons Westminster wont let Scotland go no.101 (whilst implying we are scroungers dependent on England for our continued existence) - }}

'At 6.00pm this evening Scotland supplied 98.7% of its own electricity, 50% of Wales, and 14% of Englands. }}'- Newsnet. 01/01/2022.

Mrs Figg wrote:

ok as an opener, I fully support the rights of trans people to live in dignity and equality. Just in case it isn't clear later.

Biological womens rights are not being strengthened, that's the problem, they are being worryingly eroded. I have done a lot of research on this btw. But I wont be putting forward any other arguments because this isn't the right forum, and it will inevitably get unpleasantly messy because I have very strong views on the matter. I will just put it out there that I am a gender critical feminist or what trans activists call a 'terf' . I am against the bullying of Lesbian academics like Kathleen Stock. I fully support the LGB Alliance. I fully support J K Rowling, Helen Joyce and Graham Linehan (the author of Father Ted). That's my stance. It is uncompromising and therefore considering everything, its best if I keep any further comments to myself.

I think we may be on the same page to a large extent here.

At the end of the day, trans men and women may feel like they should have been a biological man or woman, but they are not. I think we need to be very careful about where we draw the lines here. I dont want people who genuinely feel like they should have been the other sex to not have every opportunity to live that exper8ence as closely as possible, but at the end of the day this does have impacts to other people in many areas, sport being one of them.

I dont know the right answer here because the science needs to do a lot of catching up but from what I can see some of the "progressive" policies that we seem to be putting in to law in various places is causing a lot of problems, with biological women taking the brunt of it.

{{ i think we are all largely on the same page here, my only contention with Figg comment is the implication the Scottish government has done stuff bad in this regard when in fact they haven't put a bill forward at all yet, its in the consultation phase and has been for some time. As to those being consulted, well its representatives of trans groups, womens groups, the police as they have to enforce it, and business as they have to provide whatever the law ends up deciding. And even once the consultation is over and the bill proposed it still has to be passed in the Parliament to become law.
The only thing I know of that has been introduced so far regards trans is that the police are to record the gender of an offender by the offenders preference - so if a trans person is arrested they will be listed as female not male. Which I dont see makes much difference, the important bit is they got caught and arrested, not what sex they are.

As I mentioned above I dont get why we dont just have a third gender added, we already split sport, facilities etc into male/female/disabled, so why would adding another category for trans be a problem? Then everyone is on equal footing, everyone is treated the same, and no one feels intimidated or like their rights have to be compromised by the other.
I assume there is something from a trans perspective I am missing as to why such a thing is a problem as its seems the obvious and easy way to treat everyone the same.}}

Pettytyrant101 wrote:{{
The only thing I know of that has been introduced so far regards trans is that the police are to record the gender of an offender by the offenders preference - so if a trans person is arrested they will be listed as female not male. Which I dont see makes much difference, the important bit is they got caught and arrested, not what sex they are..}}

Of course it makes a difference! It matters very much to the victim. A woman who has been raped by a man with a penis does not want to be put in the history books as having been raped by another woman. She wasn't raped by a woman was she. It is also horrific news for crime reporting and data as it makes it look as if suddenly women have become statistically more inclined to commit rape. The statistics would be skewed if biological sex is not taken into account. Its absurd and very insulting for a woman in the court room to have to call her rapist 'she'. Its quite bonkers to think that the 'feelings' of the perp overrides the rights of the victim to have the truth declared.

As for having a third gender, I think that is the way to go, that way women's sports are not turned into a dangerous place for females. I mean, Lauren Hubbard, a fat middle-aged bloke being sportswoman of the year? ffs.

{{ Id be surprised if a woman who has been raped main concern was how the statistics will look. That seems an odd thing to be worried about. All that matters is the person committing the act is caught and punished and removed from being a danger to others. Also its not very likely to happen too often going on the stats-

'Deputy Chief Constable Malcolm Graham revealed of around 47 reported rapes a week in Scotland the force had yet to encounter a single trans attacker.'

If you ask me much better for women, the police and authorities to worry and concentrate on reducing the awful stat of 47 rapes a week than worrying over how the police report records the persons gender, especially given there hasnt been a single case of a trans person committing rape yet. I honestly dont see how this threatens women or takes away any womens rights. It simply recognises the identified gender of the attacker if they are trans.

If I were raped by someone with a dick and they turned out when caught to be trans I couldn't give a flying monkeys if the police call them male, female or martian so long as they catch the bastard and I get justice. I certainly wouldnt feel that somehow my rights as victim or as a man had been trampled on by the police doing so. That'd just seem unimportant and a bit of a trivial silly thing to be concerned about.
I think there are far more pressing issues around the law and sexual assault than this.}}

Leaving aside emotions and feeling, Its all about correct data being collected. The police and other bodies need correct data to work from, otherwise in 100 years people will look at the misleading data and say "ooh look, from 2022 women suddenly started to commit more rapes". This data makes women look like they are going round attacking people when clearly they are not. Why should women get a bad rap for a few bad apples. It also figures in data for prisons, how many 'men' (with a penis) are being assigned to female prisons. Trans women obviously don't want to go to male prisons because they are super violent places, and trans men also don't want to go to male prisons because biological females would be at massive risk.
So as you said, its better if there is provision for a third category for trans people. At the moment its females who are having to take up the slack of the government doing fuck all to help.