Scotland is not the hate-filled hellhole our elite tell us it is

Not to be outdone, the Scottish Green Party ministers Patrick Harvie and Lorna Slater joined the chorus of opprobrium. Mr Harvie said that “toxic forces of hatred” were rampaging across Scotland. 

Ms Slater said the response to the new hate law had been “sad and frustrating” while apologising to gender fluid and trans people. 

This, despite official statistics showing that hate incidents where transgender identity was an aggravating factor had considerably reduced.

It’s quite obvious to reasonably-minded people that Scotland is not the hate-filled nation of monsters that the country’s political elites seek to portray. We’re actually quite a sweet and good-natured country as a matter of fact, though occasionally prone to querulousness. 

Indeed, it’s also becoming clear that by talking about the Scottish people in such uncharitable terms some politicians risk falling foul of the law that they’ve set in motion.

A reasonable person might consider that the increasingly rebarbative language being used by our politicians about the conduct of the people of Scotland is “abusive” and might be intended to stir up hatred against them.

When a group of the most powerful and privileged people label the people who voted them in as consumed by toxic tides of pure hatred, there could be unfortunate repercussions. 

Imagine you’re going for a job in England or overseas. 

Your otherwise immaculate CV would immediately be disfigured as soon as you fill out the box marked: nationality. 

Which employer in their right mind would want to recruit a person who had been born and raised in such a poisonous wee country? 

And just imagine, if you will, that Scotland did gain its independence. At present, we’re protected by the reassuring Royal Coat of Arms on our UK passports and that stately Latin phrase: Dieu Et Mon Droit. 

But shorn of that safety net, Scots travelling abroad would be getting pulled out of the airport security queues for further questioning. 

Our new Scottish passports would effectively be channelling Dieu Et Mon Tae****.

Those facial recognition scanners would be checking our coupons for signs of the hateful delinquency and psychopathy to which our own political leaders keep referring. 

Our names would be getting registered on those shared electronic files used by global security agencies marked “for the watchin”. 

Power and privilege
NEVERTHELESS, I believe it behoves us all not to react badly to the hatred being expressed by our politicians towards the rest of us. Instead, I think we should seek to understand where all this hatred comes from.

Is there something lurking in their upbringing that has triggered such obvious revulsion to the people who voted for them?  

Have they perhaps been spending too much time on social media and become all distressed and triggered by the gnarly and injudicious observations of the masses?

Perhaps, being cocooned in their privileged Holyrood bubbles, they’ve just forgotten what an ordinary man and woman on the street looks and sounds like. No matter. Something seems to have wounded them badly for them to have reacted in this way and I think we should be kind and compassionate in our responses rather than rise to the bait. 

I’d be in favour of devising a week-long diversity awareness course that the SNP and the Scottish Greens would be obliged to attend. This could be delivered by genuine reality-experienced people and include role-playing sessions on beanbags. 

Psychologists could be on hand to provide counselling for these politicians as they open up about the unaddressed traumas that have led them to lash out against their own. We could bring in live animals to help them re-connect with their softer instincts.

Children’s nursery rhymes could play on a loop to help create a non-threatening and holistic environment. 

Green energy
JUDGING by the bitterness in some of the views being expressed by such as Mr Yousaf, Mr Harvie and Ms Slater, it may be that something more intense is required to heal them. 

Could we perhaps set up special truth and reconciliation sessions where they get to apologise to some ordinary Scots for all the hurtful things they’ve been saying about them?

And would it be too much to ask that we, in turn, hug them and tell them they’re forgiven and that we’ll say no more about it? 

Love the sinner, love the sin. That’s what I always say. 

Maybe, in the more extreme cases, politicians could participate in one of those lifestyle swaps that you see on reality television shows. 

Mr Harvie, for instance, could spend a week living with a family in a council estate for the purposes of appreciating their everyday challenges and – more importantly – become familiar with the way they express themselves.

It would demystify some of their edgier locutions and idioms. 

No clean city
IN Glaswegian street parlance, for instance, even the most seemingly offensive and tawdry expressions can radiate kindness and redemption. Take the C-word for instance. In Glasgow, we have largely stripped this errant noun of its toxicity and rendered it affable. 

Thus, a person might be approvingly described as “a good c***”, or “a decent c***, or at least “not a bad c***. 

Sometimes it’s simply a matter of observing closely the body language and facial expressions of the person using said appellation.