Friday 19 September 2014

Trying to Explain the Seemingly Inexplicable. (The aftermath of the vote.)

What do you say to your two young sons when they look to you for an explanation for something that they find inexplicable? When they are so shocked and saddened and express shame at the result of the vote – even though you advised caution and told them, from day one, to expect the worst – that they don’t know what to say. When they wonder if they’ll ever get the chance to change this.

Well, I tried to make them laugh and told them this:

“Imagine someone came into your house one day and said, ‘Yeah, I like this. Okay, this is going to be mine, and everything in it will be mine but I’ll let you use everything – up to a point. I want you to go out to work every day and give me your wages, then I’ll give you some money back that will probably be enough to keep at least half of the house water-tight and habitable. Oh – and I’m going to put a bomb in one of the bedrooms. Don’t worry about it – it probably won’t go off and kill you all or anything – but one day I might get into a fight with someone and I’ll need that bomb as a threat. I don’t want to have it in my house, so you just hang onto that for me and keep it safe. So, how does that all sound to you?’

And you answer with a thumbs up and a smile, ‘cause, you know, he’s bigger than you and he has more pals and he’s promised to put a good word in for you with those pals and to let you play in any games they have planned – so long as you stick to their rules. And he tells you you’re part of his family now and he loves you and he’ll always be there for you – so long as you behave. And everything is easier when you’re not in charge – he’ll take all the big decisions for you and you don’t even have to think much. Actually, he’d prefer you not to think very much at all.”

Well, they started laughing at the line about the bomb and then they were smiling and shaking their heads and sighing, but they were still smiling.

It’s a simplistic analogy, obviously, but the point was to make it seem so ridiculous, they would laugh and smile. It worked.

Tomorrow we’ll talk about the day you wake up and think, ‘Hang on – there’s something not right here. A few of us in the house are doing well under this plan, but most of us aren’t. And I’m not sure I was listening properly about the bomb stuff. I think we should take the house back.’

It didn’t work this time – we didn’t get it back. We had a hard road getting our message out there given that our only outlet for an un-spun view of our plans was social media. Not everyone uses social media and many who do use it don’t use it for political purposes, so many people never got the facts as the YES side saw them.

Would it have made a difference? We’ll never know.

I’ve seen people complain that we shouldn’t have been ‘allowed’ this referendum, that we shouldn’t be ‘given’ anything now that we’ve voted NO. People angry that the FM ‘dared’ to do something that divided our country.

Allowed. Given. Dared. Let those words sink in.

The fact that 45% of us wanted change shows that the nation was already divided in opinion, just as it is already divided in wealth and poverty. To say that we should not have been allowed to say so – that our voices should not have been heard - is to say that we are undeserving of democracy.

But 55%  didn’t want change – most of them didn’t want the referendum at all and just wanted to leave everything as it was. That is the reality of today.

I scrolled through my Facebook newsfeed and was pleased to see only two people gloating: one Scot who has always been a bit gloaty (it's a word now) and the other an English friend whose threads have always been full of people slagging us off and questioning our right to be 'allowed' to do this and demonising the First Minister and the YES Campaign in general (all stuff fed by the media and believed 100%), so that was to be expected.

I've chosen my friends well.

I’m glad to say that many who were on the opposite side are now saying it was a good thing. Many NO voters saying thank you to the YES team for starting something, for opening Westminster’s eyes to the fact that we will not just carry on without being heard. Many English friends who started off against us saying thank you because they hope it will awaken political activism in their country.

But we need them to do more than just say thank you. We need them to join us now to fight for the fairer society our poor and disabled and disenfranchised deserve. The society we all deserve.

We have to join together now – we all live here so we have no option - and we either join together to say, ‘It’s all fine and lovely and I accept my lot,’ or we join together to say, ‘Listen to us – we’re not going away.’

And that’s what I’ll tell my sons tomorrow. 

This was my generation’s chance and we failed in our main goal but we may have started something that they can continue. One day, I hope my sons’ generation get the chance to take our country back and I hope they seize it with both hands.

2 comments:

  1. It seemed to us, watching from the south, that many of those who voted 'no' still wanted change, but just not to leave the UK. The referendum certainly didn't speak of complacency; the turn-out alone was incredible. There's an election next year and so there are still opportunities for negotiations and change.

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  2. Apologies, Tracy - for some reason I didn't get a notification of a comment.

    There were, definitely, some who still wanted change and still believed in Westminster's capacity to deliver that change, despite all the evidence to the contrary. They are the ones the most devastated by the back-tracking and twisting of the 'vow' made on the 18th and by the sudden discovery that here is, indeed, a much better future in oil than was stated on the 18th and by the sudden unbiased reporting that has the Scotsman now stating that a YES vote would have benefited the entire UK economy.

    But I have realised that far more people genuinely hold Britishness and flag and 'queen and country' dear than I had imagined. No evidence or alternative views would have swayed them from their vote.

    I feel in an odd place now. Before the vote we knew that we were a country. We were a country sold out by wealthy landowners many years ago. We were not a conquered nation - we never had that gripe - we were simply sold out. But that meant we could still say this was not our choice, not our destiny.

    If I'm honest, I no longer know what we are. It seems to me like we were a country who voted to be a region and I've lost my pride, my country and my identity.

    Maybe that will pass.

    As for changing things through general elections - that will, as almost always, be outwith our control. The Scottish vote rarely has any effect on general election results, and while we do often get the party we voted for, it is by accident rather than design.

    And nowadays, the difference between the Westminster parties is so subtle that I often fail to see it.

    Thanks for reading and commenting and apologies again for the tardy response. x

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