WHO owns and creates culture? All the books, music, images, media that make up our lives – who has the authority to decide what qualifies as art?

It might seem self-explanatory. We are taught in schools and by relatives about the great creative works of the past. We are surrounded by an unending stream of content from popular culture. And every museum and library is filled with exhibitions of local and global significance.

But there are constant arguments about what qualifies to be taught in school or exhibited as “public art”.

The exclusion of the mince pie, for instance, irked Glaswegian poet Tom Leonard. In his 1973 essay on culture he rallied against the hypocrisy of the “high-minded”, the tedium of universities and the property-obsessed class system. The official arts, Leonard argued, presents a narrow selection of works based on status, power and control.

That mince pie problem re-emerged this week. A Scottish rap artist by the name of Loki took on the complacent consensus in the Scottish arts by stating that many “progressives” don’t practise what they preach and exclude working-class voices.

Culture and media, he said, “functions as a safety valve to dissuade any meaningful critical investigation of the world we live in”.

An obsession with constructive but essentially meaningless consultations creates a society where divisions are ignored. Instead, many coalesce around a diluted and sanctimonious form of democratic and social justice rhetoric. The name of that consensus is often called Civic Scotland – the established organisations that strike an enlightened pose but remain shallow in their outlook and dedication to change. You could call it an empty pie.

Artist Loki’s experience of their so-called constructive cultural or political responses translates as submission. To be constructive – in speech, in culture – often required quiet reverence while buildings and lives fell around him. Some were unconstructive and won.

In Pollok they occupied the park to protest at building a motorway through community-owned land. They resisted sheriff officers trying to evict those opposing the poll tax.

When experiences of a divided society are so polarised, then our expectation of appropriate art and politics will also divide.

When author James Kelman won the Booker prize, his use of Glaswegian characters was described as “literary vandalism”. When Glasgow was the European Capital of Culture, artists rebelled against what they saw as the sterile, city management-sanctioned form of culture on show. Even in the last fortnight the play Black Watch has been banned from a Scottish high school because its language was deemed inappropriate.

Honesty is required. People and art are judged harshly if they do not conform to established notions of proper language and expression.

Or as Leonard put it in one of his Glasgow sonnets: “This is thi six a clock news thi man said n thi reason a talk wia BBC accent iz coz yi widny wahnt mi ti talk aboot thi trooth wia voice lik wanna yoo scruff ... this is ma trooth.”

Benn’s high five questioned authority

POLITICIAN Tony Benn had five questions for the powerful.

What power do you have? Where did you get it from? Who do you exercise power for? Who are you accountable to? And how can we get rid of you?

Benn cared about democracy and accountability, even when it pitted him against the leadership of his party. That’s not easy.

But it’s important that we never stop asking those questions and extend those same challenges to those we agree with.

You may have joined a political party or already know how you will vote in May. But all politicians have their human frailties.

All power carries dangers of corruption. No organisation has all the answers and healthy self-criticism goes a long way.

Ignore the critics – social media brings you the power of learning

SOCIAL media gets a lot of flak. Nonsensically, sites like Facebook and Twitter are blamed for a host of social ills. But I think social media, especially Twitter, is great.

On Saturday morning, from just 30 minutes on Twitter, I had a window on the world. I read a round-up of articles from across the papers, found out it was the anniversary of Tony Benn’s death, followed the Women For Independence AGM, read the AyeWrite! book festival programme and found out about an occupation of Barclays Bank by protestors in Glasgow.

Like all forms of technology and media, it can be used for good and for ill. It has its limitations – but social media has enhanced our opportunity to learn, share and experience beyond old, narrower controls. That’s a power worth having.