The Rime of the 30 something voter... During this campaign there has been some beautiful polemic from both sides. I deeply admire everyone on both sides of the debate who made their decision early on, spoke about wisely and allowed their voice to inform and influence others without demanding attention. I did not participate meaningfully in this conversation. Best I can do is say I listened to Her Majesty and thought very carefully about my decision. I hold no position of power and no position of significant influence to make a claim for a greater voice than the one afforded me on my ballot. However, I expect over the coming months I will regret not sharing my feelings in the run up quite so elegantly as many of my friends on social media did. Not those who merely shared and liked the words of others, but those who laid out their thoughts and questioned what was going on. The time for me to do that is over, the vote is cast (in a fair and legal process we must believe). However, I look around me and I can feel a sense of resignation. So much disappointment and such a subdued atmosphere. I love Glasgow but I was glad to leave it after work yesterday. While a minority cheered, you could see the majority, regardless of their vote, were just fatigued and fragile. It is too early to speak of what next, but I have a cathartic need to share some of my personal observations on the campaign. Rambled and disjointed, sorry. First – there was no ‘yes’ or ‘no’ group or camp. Only campaigns. Of our 5million population all that can be said is many people voted for the concerns of their country, many voted for concerns about themselves. We voted either ‘yes’ or ‘no’ based on our personal convictions. Hence why I was disappointed to see so much reference to ‘yes’ voters behaving aggressively or ‘no’ voters being duped or hoodwinked. These phrases stereotyped entire groups of absolutely disparate people. I was also extremely concerned about the way the tag ‘Nationalist’ was attributed to so many people I consider ‘Internationalist’. And from here I will make a clumsy link to the talk of ‘borders’. To vote ‘Yes’ was often (I thought anyway) attributed to the idea of creating another border. I fear this is an obsession of being British. We are so protective over our borders and obsessed by immigration that we confuse the desire to go alone with building a wall. A strong Scotland in Europe would be afforded the chance to relax borders, not build them. Each of our airports could welcome visitors, not bark orders and ‘process’ foreigners. Only the UK would dictate whether a border with Scotland would be needed – or whether a border with any of our (UK) neighbours is needed. I feel let down by our press. I would go as far as suggesting this was a failure of our democracy. Not a single daily national (UK or Scottish) paper came out in support of independence, or gave voice to 45% of our population. Why? That is a basic lack of representation. Should I be optimistic and look at the power of social media given the voice it gave to those ticking a different box to the mainstream media, or fearful about how our little voice we are afforded in traditional channels? Another clumsy link, but having seen the breakdown in voters by age, can I speculate that the SNP’s biggest failure was in not mobilising our older population through inclusive access to online technology and communication? Much has been said of the BBC bias. I was too lazy to collect examples, but I am convinced I saw manipulation in the presentation of stories and unfortunately many others will have lost confidence in our national broadcaster too. True or false, we now have an issue of trust. I saw many excellent arguments put forward by friends and peers voting no. With a mortgage, job and young family I wanted to take a decision I could live with and took this very seriously. Several good friends will not have heard from me recently as I avoided arguments that would have been impassioned and entrenched. I wanted breathing space to try and make a responsible rather than emotional decision. But of all the arguments put forward for ‘No’, and particularly from the established ‘Better Together’ campaign, I have to question why defence came up so often? I might have misread the entire mood of our country, but I just don’t believe military defence resonates with any of us, regardless of our vote. What use does Scotland have for the toy submarines in the Clyde? For our interventions in the middle East that so far have only served as a provocation for ever more extremist groups? I just don’t understand why any party canvassing for a vote in Scotland thinks this will enthuse an electorate. And having just used the word ‘Party’ let me stumble onto my last great disappointment. ‘Vote Labour, Vote Yes’. Seriously? Look at the last electoral turn out and the proportion of the vote for Labour. At best they could hope to galvanise 20% with that rallying call. This referendum wasn’t meant to be about the parties. If anything, the unusually high electoral turn-out was a rejection of our party politics as it was the first non-abstract choice so many of us had seen. There was some other unfortunate terminology used during this campaign. Current Prime Minister David Cameron defended his involvement as having “intervened” in the campaign on 11 occasions. ‘Intervene’? At best it was a rather silly throwaway remark, at worst it betrayed his attitude to ‘our friends in the north’. Either way, that he could count these ‘interventions’ without running out of fingers and toes suggest to me that the election was won despite the ‘Better Together’ Campaign, and he and Darling have little to be proud of. Respect is a different word to admire and both are very different to like. I respect Alex Salmond on various topics, I admire his passion and dedication to a cause he believed in. During this campaign I have seen so many ugly comments made about the First Minister – so many disparaging comparisons. Despite that, he led a professional campaign and stood down when he saw he had achieved all he could. Scotland has just lost a great leader and good luck to whoever fills those shoes. We were told independence would be forever. Maybe. It is clear however that political unions are far more transient. Just watching the great 11th hour pledge fall apart shows us that. Best be optimistic that change is never far away.
Posted on: Sat, 20 Sep 2014 11:36:48 +0000
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