Ive just had a fabulous article regarding the Independence question shared with me, and feel that it is essential reading for anyone voting in next weeks referendum. I would urge you all to read it in full, regardless of which way youre thinking of voting. If you read nothing else, though, read the section Part II - A leaner, meaner Scotland? because it discusses the effect of a Yes vote on the left-wing, fairness and equality policies that so many of the Yes voters are hoping to see come into being after the referendum. Some of the points that stand out for me: For Scots to think were not going to be severely effected by the vicissitudes of the market is, to use James Staffords words, a dangerous combination of chauvinism with naivety how did a country once respected for its emphasis on reason, common sense, and principles get to the position where healthy scepticism or inconvenient truths are demonised as scaremongering lies? - this point particularly scares me because the independence debate seems almost to have altered the character of Scotland and the people who live here. Why is it that any point that doesnt fit with a particular viewpoint is immediately cried down as being scaremongering or a lie? Thats not the Scotland I grew up in, and I hope its not the Scotland of the future. The Yes campaign has also been tremendously successful thus far in using all the optimism stuff to neutralise the effects of the copious amounts of research and opinion which indicate that serious problems lie ahead. According to Yes all these people are just naysayers and pessimists who are trying to obstruct the Scottish peoples forward march to a great future Seligman argues that there are times when it makes sense to be optimistic (or use optimism building techniques if you are prone to pessimism) and times when it is better to be pessimistic. He writes: The fundamental guideline for not deploying optimism is to ask what the cost of failure is in the particular situation. If the cost of failure is high, optimism is the wrong strategy. Lets not be a country of blind optimists, but a country of people who look at every side of the possible outcomes following the referendum and take the time to choose wisely on that basis. Heads over hearts, in other words. Creating all that new machinery of state could even get in the way of vital changes that are urgently needed – altering the structure of local government to make it more democratic and involving, reforming land ownership and establishing proper control of an overbearing police authority. Paradoxically a No vote might lead to more radical politics. After all, the economic restructuring and instability which would follow independence is likely to lead to divisive rather than progressive politics. When peoples security is threatened they become more materialistic, not less. Since concerted action is required to deal with global forces, the less we are caught up in our own affairs, the more keen we may be to join up with progressives in the rest of the UK (and other countries) and to support initiatives to devolve power throughout the land. This last is the reason that Ill be voting no - I think if we vote yes then were in for a long time of hardship and austerity before we start seeing the light, whereas if we vote no then we can begin immediately working on creating the better, fairer, more in-control Scotland that I imagine the vast majority of people want.
Posted on: Thu, 11 Sep 2014 09:24:04 +0000
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