A new Desperation from Daily Mail?
While I have written a fair amount of letters to the Daily Mail over the
years I have rarely found myself in political agreement with their
editorials or their journalists. Of course in a democracy all honest
opinions are obviously welcome even if one deplores the ideas behind
them.
Nonetheless there is a fine line between fair comment and libel and the
article entitled 'a New Racism' (Daily Mail 19/04/2008) in which the
Mail's James Grant accused all nationalists of racism crossed that line.
Claiming there was some significance in the fact that the date of the
SNP's spring conference was the same as the 40th anniversary of Powell's
infamous remarks about rivers of Blood, Mr Grant went on to claim that
"Scottish nationalism like every other form of nationalism is dangerous
and has its roots in Xenophobia and racism."
His circular argument for this was that because Salmond said "As a
sovereign people the people of Scotland - and we alone have the right to
decide how we are governed", this was somehow racist to the other people
in the United Kingdom!
Let's be clear that all Alex Salmond was asserting was the right of the
people of Scotland to decide their own political destiny. When he says
"we Scots" he means all the people who live in Scotland. This right to
self determination through the sovereignty of the Scottish people was
enshrined in the Declaration of Arbroath and was much more recently
acknowledged by both the Labour and Liberal Democratic parties when they
endorsed the Claim of right for Scotland.
The Daily Mail and their correspondent must be fully aware that there
are two separate and distinctive forms of nationalism.
There is the imperial type where adherents believe in the superiority of
their country to others and attempt to assert their superiority by
conquering or exploiting other nations.
Historically both the British Empire and the Nazis fitted this form of
nationalism. There is also however the civic type where the people of a
country join together in a common democratic cause. Mr Grant admits this
when he remarks that "nationalism has often been a necessary step on the
road to democracy."
Scottish nationalism is clearly civic and is also clearly not imperial.
The SNP have no plans to invade anyone! Therefore Mr Grant's argument
has no justification whatsoever.
If unionism can only justify itself by making such deliberately false
assertions about its opponents then one can only conclude that the
arguments for the continuation of the union are not strong enough on
their own.
Independence is normality. Independence supporters run our Government
and the cause of independence has strong support across every political
party and at every level of Scottish society. If the Daily Mail wishes
to insult a possible majority of the Scottish population then they can
go ahead but they can also logically expect their readership figures to
drop like a stone.
If they continue in this vein then they should also expect to have their
day in court eventually at which point they would be expected to provide
actual proof of their allegations or pay the compensation required for
attempting to libel both the SNP and all other supporters of Scottish
independence.
years I have rarely found myself in political agreement with their
editorials or their journalists. Of course in a democracy all honest
opinions are obviously welcome even if one deplores the ideas behind
them.
Nonetheless there is a fine line between fair comment and libel and the
article entitled 'a New Racism' (Daily Mail 19/04/2008) in which the
Mail's James Grant accused all nationalists of racism crossed that line.
Claiming there was some significance in the fact that the date of the
SNP's spring conference was the same as the 40th anniversary of Powell's
infamous remarks about rivers of Blood, Mr Grant went on to claim that
"Scottish nationalism like every other form of nationalism is dangerous
and has its roots in Xenophobia and racism."
His circular argument for this was that because Salmond said "As a
sovereign people the people of Scotland - and we alone have the right to
decide how we are governed", this was somehow racist to the other people
in the United Kingdom!
Let's be clear that all Alex Salmond was asserting was the right of the
people of Scotland to decide their own political destiny. When he says
"we Scots" he means all the people who live in Scotland. This right to
self determination through the sovereignty of the Scottish people was
enshrined in the Declaration of Arbroath and was much more recently
acknowledged by both the Labour and Liberal Democratic parties when they
endorsed the Claim of right for Scotland.
The Daily Mail and their correspondent must be fully aware that there
are two separate and distinctive forms of nationalism.
There is the imperial type where adherents believe in the superiority of
their country to others and attempt to assert their superiority by
conquering or exploiting other nations.
Historically both the British Empire and the Nazis fitted this form of
nationalism. There is also however the civic type where the people of a
country join together in a common democratic cause. Mr Grant admits this
when he remarks that "nationalism has often been a necessary step on the
road to democracy."
Scottish nationalism is clearly civic and is also clearly not imperial.
The SNP have no plans to invade anyone! Therefore Mr Grant's argument
has no justification whatsoever.
If unionism can only justify itself by making such deliberately false
assertions about its opponents then one can only conclude that the
arguments for the continuation of the union are not strong enough on
their own.
Independence is normality. Independence supporters run our Government
and the cause of independence has strong support across every political
party and at every level of Scottish society. If the Daily Mail wishes
to insult a possible majority of the Scottish population then they can
go ahead but they can also logically expect their readership figures to
drop like a stone.
If they continue in this vein then they should also expect to have their
day in court eventually at which point they would be expected to provide
actual proof of their allegations or pay the compensation required for
attempting to libel both the SNP and all other supporters of Scottish
independence.
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