Good news/bad news

[f4f3]

This week's weight loss has stuck over the weekend, and I'm lighter now than I've been for a year. Go me.
The Cold is back, and I have leaden limbs and am breathing through cotton wool. Go away.

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Labour held my old Westminster constituency - very convincingly. They polled about 60% of the votes, SNP about 20%, Tories 5% (just holding their deposit) BNP just under 5% (losing their deposit, and showing no signs of a surge, in the Glasgow constituency with most asylum seekers and the poorest white working class). The rest of the vote was shared between the SDP (sixth) and various other socialist and celebrity candidates.
The links between the BNP/English Defence League and protestant extremists came out again this weekend in a rally in Glasgow. I say a rally, but the thirty or forty of them were penned in a pub before being bussed to the city limits (actually, to Paisley Road West, which is more like the Outer Limits than the city limits). There's lots of stuff here about my formative influences, from why I'm a socialist to why I can't stand the Union Jack (the two are related).

Comments

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

Well to take your first paragraph points in turn...
Not sure how up you are on social democracy, but we don't tend to count the votes that don't get cast. Silly, I know, but if you don't care enough to vote, you don't get a voice. Other forms of government are available. Your human rights may go down as well as up. 3 out of every 5 votes cast, and polling three votes to your nearest rivals one, seems pretty convincing to me. Care to elaborate on the negative campaign? The two biggest attacks on the SNP that I could see were there decision to cancel the Glasgow Airport rail link, costing 1,300 jobs, and their candidates uncertainty about where he lived. If you're going to play the local card, make sure that the paint is dry on it...
The new MP is a law lecturer who has been secretary of the local party for 10 years. I mean, obviously, that doesn't give him an understanding of politics equal to yours, but I wouldn't say he's pathetic.
Oh, and to round that para off, name calling was pathetic in the school playground, and that's where it should be left.

Not sure what you mean in para two - if it's that Scotland's main racist problem concerns the treatment of the English, I have to say you've got a point. What with the caps on English immigration, the sectarian killings and the "No Dogs Or English" signs you used to see posted in Morningside guest houses, it's a wonder anyone would move here as an economic migrant.
(Bringing my tongue out of my cheek for a moment, I was tempted to go a heckle the BNP Candidate, and tell him to go back where he came from, and that we didn't want his type around here, stealing our jobs)

[psychochicken.livejournal.com]

I know that you can't count votes not cast, but when two thirds of the people are so unmoved by the activity of any of the parties you've got to see something's wrong. There simply was no "convincing" winner when only 22% (or so) percent of people voted for him. Sure there will be a section of people who wouldn't vote unless Ant and Dec insisted they do so, but 33% is an embarassment of a turnout, and the reason is that people frankly don't want to cast a vote of support for any of them. I know I'm having serious problems about where I'm going to put my cross next time and I'm not alone.

As for the negative campaign, the general feeling was that he depicted the SNP as Edinburgh centric and played on the parochial feelings of his constituents to paint them in a bad light. I don't live in his constituency (and neither do you) so he didn't actually campaign to me personally, I'm only going on what I've read in the press/internet about it. I will say he's by no means the only guilty party - they're all at it - which makes my point again about how none of them are frankly worth our support.

No matter what though, I cannot for life of me see how convincing 22% of a Glasgow constituency where Labour's general election rivals barely dear show their faces can be in any way indicative of support for the prime minister come the next General Election, which was his assertion. No matter what his other credentials, that's just plain stupid and any credibility his tenure as party secretary or employment might have given him disappeared in a puff of smoke as he said it. Just saying it as I saw it.

To elaborate the second point, it was that any racist organisation that exists in Scotland would have as its first target the English, and the EDL are (I'm ashamed to say) an English organisation therefore they're unlikely to garner the support they're looking for. Ironic one might say.

Oh and there are in fact racially motivated attacks against the English (trust me, I've received a couple) and I have seen "English go home" and other less polite slogans on walls, as well as shouted at me and my family in the street, so don't patronise me. Mind you, for all the beatings from mindless thugs, it's the laughing-it-off attitude from the educated that hurts the most.

[psychochicken.livejournal.com]

I was being generous. 60% of 33% is actually 19.8%.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

A 33% turnout is terrible - it truly is pathetic. But it's not Labour's problem exclusively, and it's certainly not a reason for not accepting that they have a new MP, at a time when we're being told that Labour is dead in the water. Political opinion has swung from taking the SNP's claims of a potential 20 seats at the General Election seriously, to wondering if they will recover at all (which isn't to say they might not remain in power at Holyrood - we seem to be acquiring a very sophisticated electorate up here).
What do you mean, Labour's opponents dare not show there face in the constituency? Why not? Were they being run out of town on rails?
"played on the parochial feelings of his constituents "
Are you really accusing Labour of campaigning based on the interests of their voters? Devious bastards! What will they stoop to next?
And you're right - I don't live in the constituency. But I did for fifteen years, and my mum has lived there for 35. Although she'll be the first to tell you I don't visit often enough I've spent a hell of a lot more time there than anyone reporting on the election.
I'm sorry if you feel patronised. But if you honestly believe that the biggest victims of racism in Scotland are the English then you're just plain wrong. If you like I'll quote chapter and verse on racially inspired assaults and murders. Am I laughing at ANY racist attitudes or actions? No. Do I find the idea that racism towards the English is the worst manifestation of racism in Scotlan laughable? God yes.

[psychochicken.livejournal.com]

1) I haven't said it's exclusively labour's problem. It's not. Nor have I said it makes them any less the winners of this contest. What I *have* said is that calling it "convincing" is taking things a little far. An opinion I stand by.
2) By Labour's GE opponents I refer to the Tories; as opposed to their local election opponents, the SNP. Whilst the Tories aren't literally being run out of town, I can't imagine they have any illusions of victory there. Anyway, the point was that the opponents are different in the two battles.
3) Parochial feelings is hardly the same thing as interests.
4) Did I say racism against the English was Scotland's worst racism problem? Don't believe I did. However I will say that it's by far the most ingrained and accepted prejudice. There are people who will make anti-English statements that wouldn't dream of saying anything against Asians, but then that's because it's not really considered racism. It is the most relevant form to the conversation because we were talking about an English organisation seeking support from a Scottish one.
5) Actually, I think you were laughing at racism towards the English. You were certainly a long way off taking it seriously.

[f4f3.livejournal.com]

1. We're not going to agree on this one - I'm talking about the result of the election, you're talking about disenchantment with the political process. We can both be right, and both wrong.
2. If Scotland return 45 Labour MPs and no Conservative MPs (or even somewhere in single figures) at the next general election, as this result suggests, then that's a pretty ringing endorsement of Labour from Scotland. Is it an endorsement of Brown? Well it would make a pretty poor condemnation.
3. The parochial feelings seemed to be that an SNP government favoured Edinburgh over Glasgow. Right or wrong, that's a feeling tied in pretty strongly with their interests.
4. You said "any sympatheticly racist organisation in Scotland would have them penned as public enemy number one ahead of anyone with coloured skin." Which I took to mean that for any racist organisation the English would be public enemy number one ahead of anyone with coloured skin. Is that different from saying that the English are the most racially discriminated against?
Well there is an argument that I can see that you were referring only to hypothetical organised racists in Scotland - if that's your argument then I still say it's wrong, and obviously wrong. Is it the most ingrained and accepted prejudice? Worse than sectarianism, or homophobia? I got beaten up by a lot of Protestants when I was a boy, and a lot of homophobes and a lot of anti-intellectualists (although to be fair the latter two were pretty synonymous), and I'd suggest that they haven't changed their opinion as they grew up. "There are people who will make anti-English statements that wouldn't dream of saying anything against Asians, but then that's because it's not really considered racism." and that's wrong - but the things they are saying don't tend to run to rounding them up and sending them home. I understand that you are as sensitive to those remarks as I am to anti-Scottish remarks in England. One of the reasons I DIDN'T go tell the BNP candidate to go back to where he came from was because it WOULD have been a racist statement. It might have been funny in context, but it would still have been racist.
5. If I had responded in a serious manner then it would have been very serious indeed. I would have had to put forward examples of racism towards non-white people in the UK (English, Scottish and other nationalities), and specifically racist actions by Scots and English in Scotland and England, to point up by contrast the reality of racist acts in both countries. This would have been a good way to win an argument, but I don't think it would be worth it.

[psychochicken.livejournal.com]

Still don't think the win was 'convincing'.
Still think racism towards the English is at least on a par with sectarianism it terms of pervasive acceptance. Whilst homophobia and anti-intellectualism are vile prejudices, I don't think they count as racism.

I'm walking away now as as you have stated there's no way we're going to reach any sort of accord here.